Lately, John and I and some of our friends have been talking about love languages. There is a book that many people know about...The Five Love Languages. I have to admit I have never read it cover to cover but I think the whole principle of the book is very interesting and lately have seen how the way you give and receive love is very important. The love languages are: Physical touch, Quality time, Gifts, Words of affirmation, and Acts of Service. If you figure out what makes you tick, what makes you feel good, loved, and affirmed then this is mostly likely your love language. From what I understand this is the way we want to receive love and most of the time it is easy for us to give love in this way as well. Many couples I am sure never figure this out. Lately John and I have had friends that have "figured" this out and have taken time to explore their love languages and so John and I started talking a lot about it. For instance in our marriage, I love to hear (with words of affirmation) that John loves me, appreciates me, wants to be around me, etc. This creates a problem sometimes when he doesn't speak those words to me (John is not a talker). I feel like he doesn't care...but when I say this to him he says are you kidding, you know I care because of the things I do for you....hence his love language coming out....acts of service. He is the most amazing husband in his acts. He helps around the house, takes care of us, does Daddy Duty better than any man I know, etc. You should have seen the way he took care of us when I was sick during my first trimester. John is a doer, this is how he shows love....and needs to receive it! This causes problems in that I am NOT a doer! If you want to show John love then make him breakfast in the morning, pack his lunch, keep the house presentable, and have his laundry washed! I am not the best at any of these acts although I tell him everyday he is loved, what a wonderful person/husband he is, how amazing he is etc.(does he even hear this?)....so how do two people that have different love languages come together...well I guess differences attract and that is what makes marriage fun and hard..We have to really work at showing love to the other person. It helps when you actually figure things like this out. We laugh about it a lot! He knows now why I constantly ask for his approval with dinner and being a mother etc. It is actually kind of funny when you know this about yourself b/c you can laugh at yourself. When I got off of work the other day, I was in the best mood...WHY? Because three different people had told me how cute I looked that day pregnant...how vain is that!
It is also interesting to figure out what your children's love languages are. We know that Emily's has to be physical touch. She loves to hug, kiss, touch, and cuddle. If you turn her down b/c you just feel plain "hung on" then she is extremely dissappointed and feels rejected.
We think (even though you are not suppose to "assign" a love language to your children until age 5) that J.D.'s is words of affirmation. He does extremely well with praise and likes to know he has done a good job.
Kind of a fun thing to explore!
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