LOVE LANGUAGES

Thursday Morning Moms’ Group—Current Study  The Five Love Languages of Children / Teenagers

As moms, we love our children—but do our children get the message and have their emotional needs met?  Or does our love get lost in translation?  The premise of all the Love Language books by Gary Chapman (see www.5lovelanguages.com) is that people communicate and receive love in a variety of “love languages,” of which he identifies five main categories:  physical touch, words of affirmation, quality time, gifts, and acts of service.

The books in our current study apply the love languages principle to communication with our children as we read and discuss The Five Love Languages of Children by Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell, MD, with one of the discussion blocks using The 5 Love Languages of Teenagers.  The pairing of Chapman and Campbell (author of How to Really Love Your Child) brings a rich wealth of understanding, while the Teenagers book deals with the challenge of communicating love to our teens as they develop growing independence.

The Love Language books give numerous illustrations of the various love languages, for example:

Allyson, age 7:  “I know my mommy loves me because she hugs me.”  (physical touch)

Ryan, age 15:  “I don’t have a dad, but I know my mom loves me.  She tells me how proud she is of me and encourages me to make something of myself.” (words of affirmation)

Jeremy, age 12:  “I know my dad loves me because he spends time with me.  We do lots of things together.  He has season tickets to the Wake Forest football games and we never miss a game.  I know my mom loves me too, but we don’t spend much time together because she often doesn’t feel well.” (quality time)

Frankie, age 5, after his second day in kindergarten:  “My teacher loves me.  Look what she gave me.” (holds up a bright blue ruler with large numbers printed across it, the evidence of his teacher’s love.

(gifts)
Todd, age 17:  “I’ve got the greatest dad in the world.  He taught me how to mow grass, start a business, and make money so I could buy a car.  Last week, he showed me how to change the spark plugs.” (acts of service)

Both books provide help in figuring out your child’s love language(s) and practical suggestions of how to communicate love in each of the love languages.  If there could be one verse that summarizes this study it might be 1 John 3:18, Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.

Carol