Do you have a significant other that isn’t a speech-language pathologist? If so, this post is for that main squeeze of yours. Yup, I’m talkin’ to all the non-slp sweetie pies out there, so listen up. If you’ve given your heart over to an SLP, you’re one lucky duck because we all know that SLPs are the BEST. So, in an effort to help you be the BEST partner to your lovely SLP, I’m going to give you four solid date night ideas that I can guarantee every SLP would adore. Trust me, you’re gonna thank me for this one.
1. Permission to whisper during the movie.
There’s nothing more classic than the traditional dinner and a movie. This date night idea is just that, but it’s got the perfect SLP twist to it. During the movie part, allow your SLP soul mate to whisper to you whenever he/she spots any type of communication disorder in a film character. Because, here’s the thing, all of us SLPs are secretly diagnosing things like that in movies all the time. So if you give your SLP baby doll permission to whisper the diagnosis (quietly, of course) to you during the movie, he/she will love you to bits. “Oh, that character totally has to be a person who stutters! Those temporary disruptions in his forward flow of speech are called disfluencies.”
2. Transcribe some romantic poetry.
Nothing better communicates warm and fuzzy feelings of love than a good poem. So together with your SLP partner in crime, how about shooting over to your local library and findin’ some romantic ones to read to one another? Then, allow your lovely SLP to transcribe a few of those poems to IPA. Because here’s the thing, all of us SLPs can’t get enough of phonetic transcription. In case you didn’t know, IPA stands for the International Phonetic Alphabet. It’s a standardized representation of the sounds of oral language, so go ahead and give him/her permission to draw out those little symbols. He/she will be all googley eyed for you!
3. Test drive some new games together.
SLPs are some of the most avid game fans out there. For good reason, too, because many of us utilize games as a means for increasing the speech and language abilities of our students. We just have this magical way of tweakin’ and changin’ a game so that it perfectly relates to the goals and objectives of the given students in our group. But here’s the thing, sometimes we need to try out the potential game before we introduce it to the children on our caseload. So if you ask your SLP love bug if there are any games that he/she might be dying to try, changes are that you’ll get a loud and enthusiastic YES! Go on over to your favorite store, buy the game, and set up a little game night together to play it. You can pretend to be the student and your significant other can be the SLP. You’d be surprised at just how FUN this game night idea really is!
4. A dollar store shopping spree.
I’ve got two words for you. Dollar. Store. I know that every single SLP out there will agree with me when I say that dollar stores make us smile wider than, well, a dollar bill! So if you want to melt the heart of your SLP prince or princess, offer to take him/her to the dollar store for a dollar store date night. Ten dollars goes a long way in the enchanted land of dollar speech therapy materials, so tell him/her to go wild because it’s on you. Go down the aisles together and encourage him/her to describe to you how he/she could use that particular thing-ah-ma-jig in speech therapy. Because here’s the thing, we love talkin’ about stuff like that. But the only thing you need to caution with this SLP date night idea is the timeframe. Sometimes a trip to the dollar store for us SLPs can last hours (HAHA! SERIOUSLY!). We’re like kids in a candy store when it comes to dollar stores, ya know? So be prepared!
In closing . . .
These ideas are not only awesome for the sake of being awesome, but they can also help you to better understand why your SLP partner loves being an SLP so much. And that can absolutely strengthen your relationship because it’s showing your SLP significant other that you have an obvious curiosity and respect for the amazing field of speech-language pathology. So go on! Give these SLP date night ideas a try as soon as possible and let me know how they go!
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