how often do you get to have datenights since having kids?

when i was pregnant with my first my parents convinced me to move back to my hometown saying we would need someone to watch the baby so we could have date nights or have breaks. my kids are now 3.5 years old and 22 months old and we haven’t been able to go on one date or go out to do anything that’s not a doctors appointment or grocery shopping without the kids as when we ask my parents (the only ones who can watch the kids) say they won’t and their exact words are “we are not raising your kids, we already had ours”
i don’t feel comfortable hiring a sitter as my kids are still small and my oldest has autism and is pretty much nonverbal so i worry about her with someone she’s not comfortable with.

we did lie one time that a doctors appointment ran late and stopped at mcdonald’s on the way home and even that only lasted 10 minutes before the calls started that we need to hurry up but that 10 minutes was nice lol. my bf pointed out that this isn’t normal and we’re kind of realizing some of our problems are coming from the fact that we’ve spent no time together without the kids with 3.5 years

we are going to start trying to have home date nights when the kids go to bed whenever he’s home and if we’re not too tired that night but i just wanted to see what it’s like for everyone else