“Boys only want you for your body.” Growing up, that was my mother’s mantra, and naturally, it became what I expected of them. Little did I know it would influence my perspective of the relationships I would have in the future.
When Justin (name changed to protect identity) and I reconnected after years, it blew my mind how much we had in common. We got along better than I had with any guy I have known. Naturally, it only took weeks of hanging out almost every day for us to confess we had feelings for each other.
The first few months, we were in the honeymoon phase. To me, Justin could do no wrong, and I felt extremely cared for. I would wake up every morning to an extremely long text message about how grateful he was that we reconnected and how happy he was that I was a big part of his life.
On our first date, he held my hand the entire time and showered me with compliments. He would reply to my Instagram stories telling me I looked beautiful. He would have his hands around me for the entire duration of a movie.
Justin did every single thing any girl out there could have wanted. I felt good, and things felt right — until they didn’t. And at first, I could not figure out why.
It truly was as if the fog I had been looking at the relationship through was clearing up. Nothing much had changed except for the fact that we were now closer than we were before.
Justin and I began spending more time together, talking to each other, and of course, our conversations started becoming deeper. I enjoyed talking to him and spending time with him, but for some reason, I did not feel as loved as I did at the beginning.
So, I began reevaluating our relationship. I noticed that Justin’s morning messages to me were very repetitive and conveyed the same message in different ways. Some days it was a short and sweet three-line text, but on others, it took me almost ten minutes to read.
As each day went by, I became lazier and lazier to read his messages or to attempt a reply that showed him I cared as well. I avoided going online just so he would not know that I was avoiding him, and I would give some random excuse about why I had no time to reply.
When we did meet up in real life, I wanted to try and connect with him the way we did before. I would suggest lunch at the mall so we could go to the cinema later on if we wanted to — and we always did, but rarely did we ever watch a movie.
Each time we were in a cinema hall, Justin would try to put his hands down my pants, or he would be kissing my neck or suggesting we sneak off to the rooftop for a makeout session.
I decided to talk to him about it. I told him I did not feel like he loved me, even if he that was the first thing he told me every morning. I informed him that I was unhappy that all he wanted to do was touch and makeout whenever we met. Justin responded by saying he was upset that he made me feel that way, and he would do better.
A couple of weeks go by, and this was becoming a recurring theme. From being the dream guy girls wanted, he was slowing starting to become the one that my mother warned me about; the kind of guy who was only good at words and wanted nothing more than my body.
I was devastated. How could I not have seen this coming? Are all guys really this manipulative? I cried my eyes out before finally breaking up with him. But Justin was so confused. He genuinely believed from the bottom of his heart that he did everything he could to make me feel loved.
After going back and forth for days, I finally blocked him from all social media platforms and deleted his number from my phone. I wanted nothing to do with someone who merely wanted to use me for my body.
He was an awful person, right? Wrong.
. . .
I discovered the five love languages a couple of years ago when I watched a video about it online. The basic idea is that there are five ways in which we express and understand love, namely, quality time, acts of service, words of affirmation, physical touch and gifts.
“Your emotional love language and the language of your spouse may be as different from Chinese and English. No matter how hard you try to express your love in English, if your spouse understands only Chinese, you will never understand how to love each other.” — Gary Chapman
If you have not already guessed it, Justin’s love languages were words of affirmation and physical touch. It was the way he understood he was loved and how he expressed it to others. In his eyes, telling me that I was beautiful and constantly touching me meant he loved me.
The quote above rang true for my relationship because my love languages were quality time and acts of service. I wanted nothing more than his undivided attention and for him to be fully present while we were together. So I could not see that he was trying to show me that he loved me.
. . .
I vowed to incorporate the theories I had learned into my next relationship, and it was one of the best I had experienced. Diego (name changed to protect identity) and I crossed paths multiple times at various events. However, as with Justin, we properly reconnected only after a couple of years.
Once I noticed we were beginning to grow closer, I knew I had to figure out what his love language was. So, I paid close attention to everything he said and did. Diego would drive me everywhere we wanted to go. He would open the door for me so I could enter, held my hand throughout the entire ride and even let me choose which songs we listened to.
At the cinema, Diego would carry the popcorn and drinks, handed the ticketer our entry tickets and use his body to push open the doors of the cinema hall. As you would expect, while watching the movie, he had his hands around me the entire time.
I concluded his love languages were acts of service and physical touch. A sense of relief washed over me as I realised there was at least a little bit of overlap there. We both expressed and understood love by doing things for other people.
However, I was afraid that some parts of our relationship might be a repeat of my previous one because his second love language was physical touch. So, I decided to talk to him about it.
At first, Diego was apprehensive about the concept of love languages in general, but he came around after I explained to him how it had affected my previous relationship. And things between us changed drastically after that.
Because we both shared a similar love language, doing things for each other came naturally to us. The other two, however, we knew would require work.
When Diego and I would have a conversation, he gave me his undivided attention. His phone was always in his pocket, and he would not even check it when it vibrated. He also took me to the beach late one evening, and we walked for an hour while talking about every topic under the sky.
I felt more loved than I had before, but I also knew I needed to do the same for him. I made it a point to hug Diego every time I saw him, and it never failed to put a smile on his face. Making the first move to hold his hand while we walked had the same effect.
Sometimes it truly is the little things that make the biggest difference. Our relationship grew stronger each day because the two of us made an effort to understand how the other person felt loved and put effort into making them feel that way. It was a choice that we made, and it worked miracles.
So, whether you are married, in a relationship, or getting to know different people, make it a point to learn your partner’s love languages.
There could be something you’re missing out on — and it could be the secret to your relationship’s success.
—
This post was previously published on Hello, Love and is republished here with permission from the author.
—
***
If you believe in the work we are doing here at The Good Men Project and want to join our calls on a regular basis, please join us as a Premium Member, today.
All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS.
Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.
Talk to you soon.
—
Photo credit: Rawpixel