by Gary Chapman
Your Turn
Recall some nonsexual “touching times” that enhanced intimacy between the two of you. What made these times special?
If your spouse’s love language is
PHYSICAL TOUCH:
1. As you walk from the car to go shopping, reach out and hold your spouse’s hand.
2. While eating together, let your knee or foot drift over and touch your spouse.
3. Walk up to your spouse and say, “Have I told you lately that I love you?” Take her in your arms and hug her while you rub her back and continue. “You are the greatest!” (Resist the temptation to rush to the bedroom.) Untangle yourself and move on to the next thing.
4. While your spouse is seated, walk up behind her and give her a shoulder massage.
5. When you sit together in church, when the minister calls for prayer, reach over and hold your spouse’s hand.
6. Initiate sex by giving your spouse a foot massage. Continue to other parts of the body as long as it brings pleasure to your spouse.
7. When family or friends are visiting, touch your spouse in their presence. Putting your arm around him as you stand talking, or simply placing your hand on her shoulder says, “Even with all these people in our house, I still see you.”
8. When your spouse arrives at home, meet him or her one step earlier than usual and give your mate a big welcome home. The point is to vary the routine and enhance even a small “touching experience.”
THE 5 LOVE LANGUAGES
Words of Affirmation
Quality Time
Receiving Gifts
Acts of Service
Physical Touch
chapter 9
Discovering Your
Primary Love Language
Discovering the primary love language of your spouse is essential if you are to keep their emotional love tank full. But first, let’s make sure you know your own love language. Having heard the five emotional love languages,
WORDS OF AFFIRMATION
QUALITY TIME
RECEIVING GIFTS
ACTS OF SERVICE
PHYSICAL TOUCH,
some individuals will know instantaneously their own primary love language and that of their spouse. For others, it will not be that easy. Some are like Marcus, who after hearing the five emotional love languages said to me, “I don’t know. It seems that two of those are just about equal for me.”
“Which two?” I inquired.
“‘Physical Touch’ and ‘Words of Affirmation,’” he responded.
“By ‘Physical Touch,’ what do you mean?”
“Well, mainly sex,” Marcus replied.
I probed a little further, asking, “Do you enjoy your wife running her hands through your hair, or giving you a back rub, or holding hands, or kissing and hugging you at times when you are not having sexual intercourse?”
“Those things are fine,” said Marcus. “I’m not going to turn them down, but the main thing is sexual intercourse. That’s when I know that she really loves me.”
Leaving the subject of physical touch for a moment, I turned to affirming words and asked, “When you say that ‘Words of Affirmation’ are also important, what kinds of statements do you find most helpful?”
“Almost anything if it is positive,” Marcus replied. “When she tells me how good I look, how smart I am, what a hard worker I am, when she expresses appreciation for the things I do around the house, when she makes positive comments about my taking time with the children, when she tells me she loves me—all of those things really mean a lot to me.”
“Did you receive those kinds of comments from your parents when you were growing up?”
“Not very often,” he said. “Most of what I got from my parents were critical or demanding words. I guess that’s why I appreciated Alicia so much in the first place, because she gave me words of affirmation.”
“Let me ask you this. If Alicia were meeting your sexual needs, that is, if you were having quality sexual intercourse as often as you desire, but she was giving you negative words, making critical remarks, sometimes putting you down in front of others, do you think you would feel loved by her?”
“I don’t think so,” he replied. “I think I would feel betrayed and deeply hurt. I think I would be depressed.”
“Marcus,” I said, “I think we have just discovered that your primary love language is ‘Words of Affirmation.’ Sexual intercourse is extremely important to you and to your sense of intimacy with Alicia, but her words of affirmation are more important to you emotionally. If she were, in fact, verbally critical of you all the time and put you down in front of other people, the time may come when you would no longer desire to have sexual intercourse with her because she would be a source of deep pain to you.”
Marcus had made the mistake common to many men: assuming that “Physical Touch” is their primary love language because they desire sexual intercourse so intensely. For the male, sexual desire is physically based. That is, the desire for sexual intercourse is stimulated by the buildup of sperm cells and seminal fluid in the seminal vesicles. When the seminal vesicles are full, there is a physical push for release. Thus, the male’s desire for sexual intercourse has a physical root.
For the female, sexual desire is far more influenced by her emotions. If she feels loved and admired and appreciated by her husband, then she has a desire to be physically intimate with him. But without the emotional closeness she may have little physical desire. Her biological sexual drive is closely tied to her emotional need for love.
Because the male is physically pushed to have sexual release on a somewhat regular basis, he may automatically assume that that is his primary love language. But if he does not enjoy physical touch at other times and in nonsexual ways, it may not be his love language at all. Sexual desire is quite different from his emotional need to feel loved. That doesn’t mean that sexual intercourse is unimportant to him—it is extremely important—but sexual intercourse alone will not meet his need to feel loved. His wife must speak his primary emotional love language as well.
When, in fact, his wife speaks his primary love language and his emotional love tank is full, and he speaks her primary love language and her emotional tank is full, the sexual aspect of their relationship will take care of itself. Most sexual problems in marriage have little to do with physical technique but everything to do with meeting emotional needs.
After further conversation and reflection, Marcus said, “You know, I think you’re right. ‘Words of Affirmation’ is definitely my primary love language. When she has been cutting and critical of me verbally, I tend to withdraw from her sexually and fantasize about other women. But when she tells me how much she appreciates me and admires me, my natural sexual desires are turned toward her.” Marcus had made a significant discovery in our brief conversation.
How Do You Know?
What is your primary love language? What makes you feel most loved by your spouse? What do you desire above all else? If the answer to those questions does not leap to your mind immediately, perhaps it will help to look at the negative use of love languages. What does your spouse do or say or fail to do or say that hurts you deeply? If, for example, your deepest pain is the critical, judgmental words of your spouse, then perhaps your love language is “Words of Affirmation.” If your primary love language is used negatively by your spouse—that is, he does the opposite—it will hurt you more deeply than it would hurt someone else because not only is he neglecting to speak your primary love language, he is actually using that language as a knife to your heart.
What makes you feel most loved by your spouse? What do you desire above all else?
I remember Mary in Kitchener, Ontario, who said, “Dr. Chapman, what hurts me most is that Ron never lifts a hand to help me around the house. He watches television while I do all the work. I don’t understand how he could do that if he really loved me.” Mary’s deepest hurt, mainly that Ron did not help her do things around the house, was the clue to
Another approach to discovering your primary love language is to look back over your marriage and ask, “What have I most often requested of my spouse?” Whatever you have most requested is probably in keeping with your primary love language. Those requests have probably been interpreted by your spouse as nagging. They have been, in fact, your efforts to secure emotional love from your spouse.
Elizabeth, who lived in Marysville, Indiana, used that approach in discovering her primary love language. She said to me at the conclusion of a seminar session, “Whenever I look back over the last ten years of my marriage and ask myself what have I most requested of Peter, my love language becomes obvious. I have requested ‘Quality Time’ most often. Over and over again, I have asked him if we could go on a picnic, take a weekend together away, shut the TV off for just an hour and talk with each other, take a walk together, and on and on. I have felt neglected and unloved because seldom did he ever respond to my request. He gave me nice gifts for my birthday and special occasions and wondered why I was not excited about them.
“During your seminar,” she continued, “the lights came on for both of us. During the break, my husband apologized for being so dense through the years and so resistant to my requests. He has promised me that things will be different in the future, and I believe they will.”
Another way to discover your primary love language is to examine what you do or say to express love to your spouse. Chances are what you are doing for her is what you wish she would do for you. If you are constantly doing “Acts of Service” for your spouse, perhaps (although not always) that is your love language. If “Words of Affirmation” speak love to you, chances are you will use them in speaking love to your spouse. Thus, you may discover your own language by asking, “How do I consciously express my love to my spouse?”
But remember, that approach is only a possible clue to your love language; it is not an absolute indicator. For example, the husband who learned from his father to express love to his wife by giving her nice gifts expresses his love to his wife by doing what his father did, yet “Receiving Gifts” is not his primary love language. He is simply doing what he was trained to do by his father.
I have suggested three ways to discover your own primary love language:
1. What does your spouse do or fail to do that hurts you most deeply? The opposite of what hurts you most is probably your love language.
2. What have you most often requested of your spouse? The thing you have most often requested is likely the thing that would make you feel most loved.
3. In what way do you regularly express love to your spouse? Your method of expressing love may be an indication that that would also make you feel loved.
Using those three approaches will probably enable you to determine your primary love language. If two languages seem to be equal for you, that is, both speak loudly to you, then perhaps you are bilingual. If so, you make it easier on your spouse. Now he or she has two choices, either of which will strongly communicate love to you.
You may also wish to take the Five Love Languages Profile found on pages 191–201. Discuss the results with your spouse.
Two kinds of people may have difficulty discovering their primary love language. The first is the individual whose emotional love tank has been full for a long time. Her spouse has expressed love in many ways, and she is not certain which of those ways makes her feel most loved. She simply knows that she is loved. The second is the individual whose love tank has been empty for so long that he doesn’t remember what makes him feel loved. In either case, go back to the experience of falling in love and ask yourself, “What did I like about my spouse in those days? What did he do or say that made me desire to be with him?” If you can conjure up those memories, it will give you some idea of your primary love language. Another approach would be to ask yourself, “What would be an ideal spouse to me? If I could have the perfect mate, what would she be like?” Your picture of a perfect mate should give you some idea of your primary love language. Having said all of that, let me suggest that you spend some time writing down what you think is your primary love language. Then list the other four in order of importance. Also write down what you think is the primary love language of your spouse. You may also list the other four in order of importance if you wish. Sit down with your spouse and discuss what you guessed to be his/her primary love language. Then tell each other what you consider to be your own primary love language.
Your picture of a perfect mate should give you some idea of your primary love language.
Once you have shared that information, I suggest that you play the following game three times a week for three weeks. The game is called “Tank Check,” and it is played like this. When you come home, one of you says to the other, “On a scale of zero to ten, how is your love tank tonight?” Zero means empty, and ten means “I am full of love and can’t handle any more.” You give a reading on your emotional love tank—10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, or 0, indicating how full it is. Your spouse says, “What could I do to help fill it?”
Then you make a suggestion—something you would like your spouse to do or say that evening. To the best of his ability, he will respond to your request. Then you ask your spouse the same questions, in the reverse order so that both of you have the opportunity to do a reading on your love tank and to make a suggestion toward filling it. If you play the game for three weeks, you will be hooked on it, and it can be a playful way of stimulating love expressions in your marriage.
One husband said to me, “I don’t like that love tank game. I played it with my wife. I came home and said to her, ‘On a scale of zero to ten, how’s your love tank tonight?’ She said, ‘About seven.’ I asked, ‘What could I do to help fill it?’ She said, ‘The greatest thing you could do for me tonight is to do the laundry.’ I said, ‘Love and laundry? I don’t get it.’”
I said, “That’s the problem. Perhaps you don’t understand your wife’s love language. What’s your primary love language?”
Without hesitation he said, “Physical touch, and especially the sexual part of the marriage.”
“I’ll wash the clothes every night if it makes her feel that good.”
“Listen to me carefully,” I said. “The love you feel when your wife expresses love by physical touch is the same love your wife feels when you do the laundry.”
“Bring on the laundry,” he shouted. “I’ll wash the clothes every night if it makes her feel that good.”
Incidentally, if you have still not discovered your primary love language, keep records on the Tank Check game. When your spouse says, “What could I do to help fill your tank?” your suggestions will likely cluster around your primary love language. You may request things from all five love languages, but you will have more requests centering on your primary love language.
Perhaps some of you are saying in your minds what one couple said to me in Zion, Illinois. “Dr. Chapman, all that sounds fine and wonderful, but what if the love language of your spouse is something that just doesn’t come naturally for you?”
I’ll discuss my answer in chapter 10.
Your Turn
Do you think by now you have a good sense of what your spouse’s love language is? How about them for you? What more could you do to explore this?
If your love tank is completely empty or very full, whether you know your love language or not, play the Tank Check game over the next month. Ask for a reading from 0 to 10 three evenings a week, and then take the suggestions of your spouse to raise that number for him/her. If your spouse is at a 10 consistently, you can pat yourself on the back—but don’t stop loving.
THE 5 LOVE LANGUAGES
Words of Affirmation
Quality Time
Receiving Gifts
Acts of Service
Physical Touch
chapter 10
Love Is a Choice
How can we speak each other’s love language when we are full of hurt, anger, and resentment over past failures? The answer to that question lies in the essential nature of our humanity. We are creatures of choice. That means that we have the capacity to make poor choices, which all of us have done. We have spoken critical words, and we have done hurtful things. We are not proud of those choices, although they may have seemed justified at the moment. Poor choices in the past don’t mean that we must make them in the future. Instead we can say, “I’m sorry. I know I have hurt you, but I would like to make the future different. I would like to love you in your language. I would like to meet your needs.” I have seen marriages rescued from the brink of divorce when couples make the choice to love.
Love doesn’t erase the past, but it makes the future different. When we choose active expressions of love in the primary love language of our spouse, we create an emotional climate where we can deal with our past conflicts and failures.
“I Just Don’t Love Her Anymore”
Brent was in my office, stone-faced and seemingly unfeeling. He had come not by his own initiative, but at my request. A week earlier his wife, Becky, had been sitting in the same chair, weeping. Between her outbursts of tears, she managed to verbalize that Brent had told her that he no longer loved her and that he was leaving. She was devastated.
When she regained her composure she said, “We have both worked so hard the last two or three years. I knew that we were not spending as much time together as we used to, but I thought we were working for a common goal. I cannot believe what he is saying. He has always been such a kind and caring person. He is such a good father to our children.” She continued, “How could he do this to us?”
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