Completely different type of love language

[Els]

I just realized a possible reason to some of the trouble the bf and I had with our relationship some time ago - our natural love languages are different. Just (yes, just - I seldom read relationship books) happened to browse through this: http://www.5lovelanguages.com/learn-the-languages/the-five-love-languages/ .

 

Now, I can't presume to speak for the bf in terms of what sort of love language he prefers to receive, but I do know that in terms of him expressing his love to me, it falls pretty much completely under 'acts of service' and 'receiving gifts', with a substantial amount of 'physical touch'. How I express love to him though, is through 'quality time', 'verbal affirmation' and 'physical touch'. As you can see, we are nearly polar opposites in this aspect, except for physical touch.

 

How do we build a strong R despite these differences? Some may say, well, make the effort to do some of the other languages too. I feel an expression of love should come freely and naturally, not just because you know the other person wants it but you aren't feeling it. So I feel it would be better for me to learn to accept and work with this. He hasn't really complained about me not doing much 'gifts' and 'service' - so I feel I should allow him leeway in terms of 'verbal affirmation' (God is he bad at that) and 'quality time' (he does do some of that, but it definitely doesn't come as naturally to him as it does to me).

 

Anyone who's made an LTR work despite the differences?

Edited November 21, 2010 by Elswyth

[Seamless74]

im so glad another author managed to probably make a $100,000.00 coming up with another crockpot theory about relationships... Said author is probably divorced and single by the way ... Love languages are you serious??

 

If your interested in your partner speaking your same love language i.e. verbal affirmations,quality time and physical touch or whatever I strongly suggest you become a lesbian... Men are just like that.. I presume throughout the course of human history men and women have always spoken different love languages...

 

The whole reason men express love in physical touch and gifts, is because we like sex and we like buying gifts that make you happy so you guys will leave us alone a bit and give us what we really want which is silence about ridiculous topics like this..

[carhill]

Anyone who's made an LTR work despite the differences?

 

My parents come to mind. Yours?

 

Think about the choices we have in how we perceive the love which is expressed by our partner.

 

We spent some time on this in MC, mainly on communication and how to ask for what we want in the realm of intimacy and love. Having the ability and desire to respond to each other's expressed wants and needs is an important part of compatibility. It starts with listening.

 

Looking back, there was no magical force at work with the 'routine' my parents developed in their marriage. They both responded to each other's communicated desires and those responses became their unique 'love language' and each valued the other's efforts and desire. Value cannot be underrated.

 

If/when I again choose to share myself with a woman, if that communication medium doesn't flow or if I sense that mutual value isn't there, bye bye.

[Els]

im so glad another author managed to probably make a $100,000.00 coming up with another crockpot theory about relationships... Said author is probably divorced and single by the way ... Love languages are you serious??

 

If your interested in your partner speaking your same love language i.e. verbal affirmations,quality time and physical touch or whatever I strongly suggest you become a lesbian... Men are just like that.. I presume throughout the course of human history men and women have always spoken different love languages...

The whole reason men express love in physical touch and gifts, is because we like sex and we like buying gifts that make you happy so you guys will leave us alone a bit and give us what we really want which is silence about ridiculous topics like this..

 

While I hope you aren't completely serious about your last paragraph , I do find the bolded quite true, actually. While us ladies at LS like to envision the perfect relationship where a guy's wants, needs and actions are completely rational and congruent with ours, perhaps there are times when, just as girls will be girls, boys will be boys. Perhaps some things are due to gender differences more than anything else us overanalysing ladies can conjure up in our minds.

 

Edit: In retrospect, I actually can think of guys whom I know (based on what I saw) are into the verbal affirmation thing, even if they are less common. I just didn't connect with them in any of the important ways though (similar interests/intelligence, etc). Also it's possibly my fault for avoiding those who were known to post 'I love you hunny muaxxx xoxoxo' on their (now-ex) gfs' facebooks...

 

My parents come to mind. Yours?

 

I honestly, could NEVER understand why my parents are together. They are so fundamentally different I think you could take two random people and put them together, and if you achieve a large enough sample size the average similarity of those couples put together would be far greater than my parents.

 

Think about the choices we have in how we perceive the love which is expressed by our partner.

 

We spent some time on this in MC, mainly on communication and how to ask for what we want in the realm of intimacy and love. Having the ability and desire to respond to each other's expressed wants and needs is an important part of compatibility. It starts with listening.

 

Looking back, there was no magical force at work with the 'routine' my parents developed in their marriage. They both responded to each other's communicated desires and those responses became their unique 'love language' and each valued the other's efforts and desire. Value cannot be underrated.

 

If/when I again choose to share myself with a woman, if that communication medium doesn't flow or if I sense that mutual value isn't there, bye bye.

I'm not sure what the bolded part means, though...? Edited November 22, 2010 by Elswyth

[carhill]

I'm busy today getting ready for a trip but will comment with more depth during downtime at the airport.

 

Communicating and listening are cornerstones of love languages. This takes effort and desire. I'll expand more on the particulars I observed in my parents later.

[threebyfate]

H and I share very similar languages of love and also, foundational backgrounds. Communication is pretty easy for us since it flows naturally.

 

But, there are times like this morning where our languages differ. He woke up grumpy as hell so I suggested he take some chill pills. Differing languages ensued!

 

It really depends on how much effort you're willing to put into a relationship. The greater the differences, the more upfront and continuous effort. To suggest that any relationship always flows smoothly and naturally, isn't realistic. To expect it to happen when you know the two of you have different languages, doesn't make sense to me. You're either going to have to both make effort to meet in the middle which is what carhill's parents have done, or find someone with which it does flow naturally.

[Star Gazer]

The way you find out someone's love language (what THEY need to feel loved) is to pay attention to how THEY express love. So if he expresses it with physical touch, he'd feel love if he received physical touch from you. You express love with words of affirmation. If he gave you words of affirmation, you'd feel loved too.

 

How to resolve these differences? Well, it's my understanding that the book is meant to be used WITH your partner, not alone. Y'all have to communicate about how your love languages differ, so that you can actually start communicating in one another's love language.

[LittleTiger]

I read this book a while back, after my exH and I split (shame I didn't find it before!) and I believe it's one of the most useful relationship books ever written - it makes total sense to me and it works.

 

One thing I would say is that I understood it slightly differently from the way you are interepreting it Elswyth. I can see why you think it is better to learn to understand and accept how the other person likes to show love but it doesn't really work that way around - at least not in the long term.

 

For example, if your partner liked to feed you home made chocolate cake every day as a way of showing his love and you don't even like chocolate cake, while you may appreciate his efforts, at some point you're going to have to say 'thanks but no thanks'. Or imagine it's you who's baking and giving the chocolate cake and your partner is the one who doesn't really like it. Wouldn't you rather know what he actually does enjoy and give him that instead? It may involve a little adjustment, such as learning a new recipe, but he's going to be so much happier and more appreciative if you make the effort.

 

As the book says, we all show our love in certain ways and we all feel loved because of certain behaviours from our partner. However, my understanding is that the way we show love does not necessarily indicate the way in which we like to be loved.

 

From memory, because it's a while since I read it, the best way to determine how you want your partner to show you love is to think about what he already does that makes you feel loved. So ask yourself the question 'how do I know that this man loves me'. The answer should tell you what you need from him in order to feel loved. If using your partner as an example doesn't work, try using a different person, such a parent, a sibling, a child or a friend. How do you know that these people love you?

 

If your partner asks himself the same question then you will able to share your answers. Once you both know what sort of behaviours will make each other feel most loved, you can act accordingly. Sometimes it doesn't come naturally if it's not your usual way of doing things and it can feel a little awkward and contrived, but it works brilliantly when you make the effort. The more you do it the more natural it becomes and the more loved your partner feels.