Sharing your love language with your partner is essential to create a healthy relationship in which both your needs are being met. This can be tough, however, when your love language just happens to be receiving gifts. Here’s how you can share that side of yourself with your partner, and avoid sounding like a spoiled French child-prince while doing so.
Be intentional with your word choice.
Word choice means the difference between communicating effectively with your partner and sounding like a pampered descendant of the late King Charlemagne. Focus on using therapy-approved “I” statements like, “I really enjoy receiving tokens of appreciation and affection” and stay away from pre-Revolution French monarchy-centric statements like, “But papa, I want mon own chateau!”.
Clarify why this is important to you.
By saying something along the lines of, “Receiving gifts makes me feel seen and cared for” you can avoid all the judgment that comes with saying something like, “Riches are my birthright, gifts my royal allowance”. Even if you do feel that way, it’s better to suppress the voice of the haughty progeny of a French monarch that lives inside of you and steer clear of any unnecessary arguments with your valet – er, partner.
Keep your examples vague.
By keeping the examples of gifts you’d enjoy receiving intentionally vague, you can make sure your partner stays in the dark about the many, many similarities that there are between you and a young Louis VII. “I love thoughtful gifts that show you listen to me” is great – “I want twelve purebred palomino quarter horses or nothing at all, à présent!” is a little too “let them eat cake!”.
If you heed these words of advice, you and your partner will come out of this conversation closer, equipped with a richer understanding of one another, and under the impression that neither of you has an unspoken, insatiable desire to lead a lifestyle à la a seven-year-old member of 17th-century French aristocracy. You can work on subtly dropping hints about the gilded snuffbox you want them to buy for you later.
