Over the Shock - Detaching and GALing 3

[Thinker]

"she really used to ask for quality time from me and needs it from her friends".

This is her love language. Think about the things that she has begged the most from you.

Believe it or not I am a physical touch person and have begged my husband for years for sex and touch. He is a quality time person. He has begged me for years to show interest in him and to do things with him. Didn't get it! We spent so much time together, but it wasn't quality time. *sigh*

I think you are right goingtofixME. I think they are all important to her, but in different ways. I used to hear all the time that I worked too much, that I wasn't there for her, etc. We used to take weekend vacations, go biking, go hiking etc etc but that all died when we had kids and bought a house that needed fixing up. After that, she kept saying "I need a vacation", "You are always working on the house" etc. I now realize that she was asking for love in her own language - quality time. What I kept hearing was complaints about things that we could neither change nor afford.

I think gifts are also important to her, as is Physical Touch, but maybe less so. She is a very physical person, and loves to be massaged, etc. She backs off on this one if she is not feeling connected, whereas I try to use this one to build a connection, so this is probably not her primary.

She is very light on praise and thanks for other people (especially me) and has never really vocalized appreciation to me, so I don't think Affirming words is high on her list.

I think that Service is also there for her, but not at the top. She has built up a lot of resentment in this area because it was missing (ie I did not help out enough around the house - more than most men, but still not enough) I think this is more of a dissatisfier ("Love Buster") than a Love Language for her.

So "Quality Time" it is, with Gifts and Physical touch as 2nds.