Thoughts from a Thinking Girl

“Do you know what your love language is?” the pediatric podiatrist asked my son.

While the doctor tended to the tenacious wart at the bottom of my son’s foot, he patiently explained the basic tenets of Love Language theory. That there is one type of love that each person seems to want the most, ask for the most, and, when we receive it, feel most specially loved. Unfortunately, people differ in their love languages, leading to the inevitable mismatch of given and received love. One person gives and gives and gives but it doesn’t “do it” for the other – we speak one language of love, give to others what we need to feel loved; we do not speak the love language of the other. So no matter how often or how much we give the love we appreciate, the other feels many things, but not deeply loved.

To figure out which love language you speak, he described as he was scraping away dead skin layers from the bottom of my son’s foot, you must choose which of five different possible gifts would be most meaningful to you, the one you want more than any of the other four.

Simple. Straightforward. The stuff of Oprah. Coming from a 60-something physician who works with people’s feet and backs, spends as much time as he can fishing, and hosts couples workshops in his home, where he helps them identify and then use the language of love.

Looking up over my son’s toes to his face, the podiatrist told my son, “I’ll ask you, then I’ll ask your Mom. I bet your Mom doesn’t know what yours is.”

Ah, a psychological awareness throwdown.

Game on.

My son’s choice was meaningful gifts – not because he’s a greedy middle school child, but because he feels known and tended to when a gift comes from the heart and captures his desires and sense of self just perfectly.

“Does your Mom know that?” he asked. “Mmmm hmmmmm,” he replied, probably thinking back to his recent stash of birthday gifts.

“Did you know that, Mom?” the podiatrist asked me.

I did, in the way that in hindsight you always know the right answer. But I easily could have gotten it wrong. Could have answered “touch” as I know how much he likes and needs hugs, back rubs, even forehead rubs when he has a headache. Or quality time, as he prefers to be accompanied in just about any task rather than be alone. Or words of affirmation, as he blossoms like a well-watered plant with words of kindness. Or acts of service, as each day is filled with meals, laundry, assistance with homework, picking up errant necessary school items, gluing letters onto his campaign posters for student body treasurer, helping in a gazillion ways.

My choice – although I waffled, as I always do, when I’m made to choose one and only one description for myself, believing that I alone among humans am so complex that a single descriptor won’t ever do me justice – was quality time. I’m always asking for it: let’s take a walk, let’s go on a hike, let’s watch a movie together, let’s sit outside in the sun, let’s do something that marks our time together as important and meaningful, then creates memories that I will nurse like a suckling infant for days, weeks, maybe months. Things that will turn into stories. Doctors appointments that turn into meaningful life conversations rather than a mere application of medical treatment to a minor condition.

As we drove home from the appointment, my son and I were feeling proud of ourselves. We had won; Bobby Flay would have been proud. We proceeded down the list of other family members, wondering if we could figure out their love languages. Not surprisingly, we wordily affirmed ourselves about getting the others “right.”

The doctor’s words made me think of how ridiculous it is that I think cooking dinner and doing laundry will ever feel like love in a household with one “meaningful gifts” person and one who needs affirmation and performs endless acts of service (psychologically ambidextrous, just as he is with tasks of life equally divided between right- and left-handedness). We’re lucky, as we speak and use all 5 languages, so we’re multilingual. I’ll do better if I remember to tip the balances in directions that make less sense to me. More gifts, more kind words. And they’ll give me time. And experiences that turn into stories. That they will give me the uninterrupted time to write. That they will then read and respond with enthusiastic praise. They will hug me when I skip around the house showing off two recently-published essays. And then I’ll head to the kitchen and prepare tonight’s unrushed dinner of Copper River salmon, my husband will saunter in and out of the kitchen to praise the aromas of dinner and rub my shoulders at the sink. Then he’ll thank me for a great meal and later wash the dinner dishes.

The bottom of my son’s foot is looking much, much better after just a few treatments. We’ll be done with appointments before I’ve learned as much as I can from the fisherman/workshop leader/husband/father/ grandfather/podiatrist. At least we’ve got one more scheduled this week. I think the doctor’s love language is words of affirmation, as he doles out praise and admiration for both of us as he diligently works away at the bottom of my son’s foot. I’ll have to remember to praise him, see if I can affirm him more than he affirms us.

I do like to win. Now which language is that?