Written by Heather Copple

Messy Marriage Team Member

 

Ever think about what makes you feel loved by other people? 

Gary Chapman wrote about it in the book, The 5 Love Languages. I’m going to talk about my husband’s and my primary love languages and the issues that have developed. We do not speak the same language (shocking I know!).

• Scott loves physical contact with me, whether it’s holding my hand or having our knees touch. It doesn’t matter so long as he can physically feel me. He feels loved when given that contact. He feels special and cared for by me with that contact.
• I don’t like physical contact and that is due to many factors from childhood. What can I say? I’m a girl that doesn’t do cuddling. Physical contact was not a good thing to me and still isn’t. It’s physically and mentally painful. So, physical contact is not the way to go to make me feel loved.
• Scott doesn’t think … and I mean that in a nice way. He just is not a thinker. He takes the world and rolls with it. He is not overly cerebral (That’s my department!). He’s not one to say “sweet nothings” or compliment someone. He doesn’t verbally show appreciation. He doesn’t stroke your ego.
• I live for verbal affirmations. They mean so much to me. I want to know what I mean to Scott via his words. I need to know he appreciates me. Needless to say, it doesn’t happen that often.

So our ways of feeling loved by each other cause some problems.

I’ve had to teach myself to, for lack of a better word, endure physical touch from Scott. It has gotten easier over the years, but I still have my limits. Scott needs this contact from me and so I worked very hard to deal with it. Scott helped me, but then he always does. He knows all about my issues and never pushes when he knows I’ve had too much.

I think it’s so important that we acknowledge and love our spouse the way that they need. We need to speak their language and help them speak ours. That means we must sacrifice our wants or needs for that of our spouse at times, and do that with sincerity and openness.I genuinely want to honor Scott by giving him the physical contact he needs to feel my love for him. Because I do love that man of mine with all I have!

Scott is still working on the verbal/cerebral part of telling me he loves me. Sometimes he needs to be prompted, which I admit sometimes makes me crazy. He is trying and that’s the point. He is working on something that is not natural and can be very hard. He loves me enough to try.

I try to be patient with him and help him. I gave him a book that had all these little written notes of affirmation for him to use whenever to help him tell me how he feels or thinks about me. I want to feel like the most amazing and most loved woman in the world. I want to know that Scott thinks and feels the same for me that I do for him and unfortunately physical contact won’t work! I need the words.

Scott thought for the longest time that touching me showed me he loved me. Truthfully it irritated me like crazy! I thought that my words of praise for my awesome husband told him how much I loved him. The words didn’t mean as much as when I would seek out his hand to hold or rub his back. It helps to know how our spouse “feels loved” because we can do that “loving” better.

What are you and your spouse’s love languages? 

What do you do to “work out” your differences in love languages?

“Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other.” –Romans 12:10

“Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works.” –Hebrews 10:24

Other verses on love – Proverbs 17:9, 1 Corinthians 13:4, 7, 13, 1 Corinthians 16:14, 2 Corinthians 6:6, Ephesians 4:2, 1 Peter 4:8, 1 John 3:18

Photo by Brooke DiDonato

Joining with NOBH, Works for Me Wednesday, To Love Honor and VacuumWhimsical Wednesday,Essential Fridays and T.G.I.F.

Now, it’s time for Wedded Wednesday!

WW rules:

Write in any way you feel inspired about marriage, parenthood or anything that reflects Christ’s redemption in your life.

1. Enter in a permalink directly to your blog post and not the main URL to your blog.
2. Be sure to include a link to Wedded Wednesday or add the WW button to your current blog post and/or sidebar.
3. Visit and comment on at least one other person’s blog that’s linked up here.
4. Please no offensive or inappropriate content or sexually explicit images!

Optional but encouraged:

• Consider setting up your Gravatar profile and Disqus Profile with a link to your blog … it makes it so much easier for all of us to find those of you who blog!
• If you have the time, visit those who visit your blog and comment at their place as well … sort of a “Say it forward.”

// <![CDATA[
document.write('’);
// ]]>