The 5 Love Languages Military Edition: The Secret to Love That Lasts (13 page)

“I have served him for twenty years. I have waited on him hand and foot. I have been his doormat while he ignored me, mistreated me, and humiliated me in front of my friends and family. I don’t hate him. I wish him no ill, but I resent him, and I no longer wish to live with him.” That wife has performed acts of service for twenty years, but they have not been expressions of love. They were done out of fear, guilt, and resentment.

A doormat is an inanimate object. You can wipe your feet on it, step on it, kick it around, or whatever you like. It has no will of its own. It can be your servant but not your lover. When we treat our spouses as objects, we preclude the possibility of love. Manipulation by guilt (“If you were a good spouse, you would do this for me”) is not the language of love. Coercion by fear (“You will do this or you will be sorry”) is alien to love. No person should ever be a doormat. We may allow ourselves to be used, but we are in fact creatures of emotion, thoughts, and desires. And we have the ability to make decisions and take action. Allowing oneself to be used or manipulated by another is not an act of love. It is, in fact, an act of treason. You are allowing him or her to develop inhumane habits. Love says, “I love you too much to let you treat me this way. It is not good for you or me.”

Learning the love language of acts of service will require some of us to reexamine our stereotypes of the roles of husbands and wives. These are changing, but models from our past can linger. Mark was doing what most of us do naturally. He was following the role model of his father and mother, but he wasn’t even doing that well. His father washed the car and mowed the grass. Mark did not, but that was the mental image he had of what a husband should do. He definitely did not picture himself vacuuming floors and changing the baby’s diapers. To his credit, he was willing to break from his stereotype when he realized how important it was to Mary. That is necessary for all of us if our spouse’s primary love language asks something of us that seems inappropriate to our role.

Some of us, however, resist doing things that do fall within our stereotypical role. When Scott and Laura married, they were both on their own career paths. Busy with her own job, Laura did not make cooking a priority. When Scott joined the military, they stayed with his parents while he completed Basic Training. “I watched how his mom cooked meals every night for her family,” Laura remembered. “She worked full-time, just like I did, but she really served her family with those meals, and Scott responded so much to them. You could just tell his love tank was being filled by that act of service.” Laura began to understand then that it wasn’t about gender but about showing love in a way her husband appreciated.

Bryant learned the same lesson while trying to express and receive love with his deployed wife, Karen. At first, he showered her with romance—emails, love letters, and care packages—but his efforts were not rewarded. “For months, my frustration grew when words of my undying love were not reciprocated,” Bryant said. “My frustration grew to anger, and before long resentment filled my heart.”

But when Bryant read
The 5 Love Languages,
he understood he was not filling Karen’s love tank, because her language was not words of affirmation or gifts but acts of service. “She didn’t want to get those care packages on a weekly basis. She didn’t want a couple letters each week or an email every night,” he remembered. “She wanted me to do my job of taking care of the family while she was gone and nothing else really mattered. When I told her about what our kids and I were doing, I saw her love meter rise. By being more financially responsible, I was able to afford more outings with the kids. Pictures on Facebook showing us at the park or zoo or at an activity on our installation—that filled her tank and led her to meet my need through words of affirmation.”

Due to the sociological changes of the past forty years, we no longer cling to certain notions of the male and female role in American society. Yet that does not mean all stereotypes have been eradicated. It means, rather, the
number
of stereotypes has multiplied. Before the days of widespread media influence, a person’s idea of what a husband or wife should do and how he or she should relate was influenced primarily by one’s own parents. With the pervasiveness of television, increased mobility, growing cultural diversity, and the proliferation of single-parent families, however, role models are often influenced by forces outside the home. Whatever your perceptions, chances are your spouse perceives marital roles somewhat differently than you do. A willingness to examine and change stereotypes is necessary in order to express love more effectively. Remember, there are no rewards for maintaining stereotypes, but there are tremendous benefits to meeting the emotional needs of your spouse.

Recently a wife said to me, “Dr. Chapman, I am going to send all of my friends to your seminar.”

“And why would you do that?” I inquired.

“Because it has radically changed our marriage,” she said. “Before the seminar, Bob never helped me with anything. We both started our careers right after college, but it was always my role to do everything at the house. It was as if it never crossed his mind to help me with anything. After the seminar, he started asking me, ‘What can I do to help you this evening?’ It was amazing. At first, I couldn’t believe it was real, but it has persisted for three years now.

“I’ll have to admit, there were some trying and humorous times in those early weeks because he didn’t know how to do anything. The first time he did the laundry, he used undiluted bleach instead of regular detergent. Our blue towels came out with white polka dots. But he was loving me in my language, and my tank was filling up. Now he knows how to do everything around the house and is always helping me. We have much more time together because I don’t have to work all the time. Believe me, I have learned his language, and I keep his tank full.”

Is it really that simple?

Simple? Yes. Easy? No. Bob had to work hard at tearing down the stereotype with which he had lived for thirty-five years. It didn’t come easily, but he would tell you that learning the primary love language of your spouse and choosing to speak it makes a tremendous difference in the emotional climate of a marriage.