Some morning when you wake up before both the alarm and your wife, turn off the alarm and wake her with a slow, gentle massage. No pressing in, just run your hands over her body, gently stroking one area a few times, then moving on to another. Don’t say anything, just feed her some morning oxytocin!
One way to understand the love languages is to think of each as a different bank account. Each account has a minimum required balance for the account to function as intended. Fall below the minimum level, and problems arise. How much each account needs depends on how important each love language is to your bride. She needs them all, but one or two are so necessary the rest don’t matter if her primary accounts are not well funded.
Varying amounts are deducted from the accounts regularly, with how much depending on what’s going on in her life. This means the amount you need to put in an account to keep it well-funded changes constantly.
With all this in mind, how is your bride’s touch account? For most women this is an important account. Letting it become overdrawn is bad for her mental and physical health, as well as for the health of your marriage. Be sure to make regular deposits of hugging, kissing, and snuggling.
By the way – if you’ve been away for a while, or have neglected touching your wife as much as she needs, she needs the touch she has missed, plus some “interest” payments as well.
As of today, it’s 75 days until Christmas. If you and your bride treat Christmas as nothing but a holiday celebrating the coming of Christ, much of what I’m going to say here doesn’t apply to you. However, most celebrate beyond this meaning, and even if you don’t odds are there are those around you (job, friends, family) who will pull you in to some degree. For many the holiday season is a several week marathon starting well before Christmas and ending only after getting home well after midnight on January 1. If both you and your wife never met a party you didn’t like, maybe that is okay. On the other hand, if either of you has ever felt overwhelmed, or over visited, or spent too much money, I suggest you talk now about what you do and do not want this holiday season. Set goals and limits, then stick to them; you’ll be glad you did.
So, eleven things to consider (yes, I know its ten lords a leaping, not eleven – that is what I get for not singing the song in my head when I posted my 13 days of titles!):
Make Jesus a real part of your holidays. It’s easy to lose sight of why we have Christmas to start with. Make sure your family, and especially your kids, get it.
Don’t spend more than you can afford. This has become a huge problem in the USofA, wit people taking months or even years to pay off credit card bills for Christmas gifts. Contrary to what retailers would like you to believe, debt is not the reason for the season!
Cost aside, try to give a reasonable number of gifts. Don’t train your children to think massive numbers of toys are the measure of a good Christmas.
Speaking of excess, try not to gain a lot of weight. If you’re going to a party or a big meal, eat less earlier in the day. Who needs to be working ones Christmas parties in May?
Manage your time. Odds are you’ll be invited to more parties than you can or should attend. Be willing to hurt someone’s feelings, and realise if you do hurt their feelings they have put their wants ahead of your good.
The above goes for family too. You don’t have to visit all the parents on Christmas day, and you don’t have to do one for Thanksgiving and the other for Christmas. If you and your wife, both want to do that fine, but you are not required to do it. I don’t care how many months your mother carried you, or how many diapers her mum changed, sacrificing your time and/or sanity to spend Christmas with them isn’t part of the fifth commandment.
Don’t kill yourself on decorations; your house should not attack airplanes mistaking you for a major airport!
Don’t play the “impress me game” with your spouse. I’m not saying ignore each other, but don’t make gift giving a challenge with high stakes. That above said, if your lady is a gifts love language person, it’s how she hears love, and you need to put a bit of extra effort into making her feel loved. (Hint, quantity and thoughtfulness are more important than cost to a real gifts love language person.)
Find a way to give to those who have no one and get forgotten. Several years our family has taken food to a local firehouse or EMS unit on Christmas Eve or Christmas day.
Look at your family traditions; ditch those that don’t work, and make new one’s that do work. Some traditions just happen (sometimes despite your best effort to avoid them) but traditions can be planned.
Last, but very much not least, leave/make time for your marriage. Time to talk, to cuddle, to make love, and time to enjoy a bit of Christmas tradition as a couple.
I can’t do a series on double standards and ignore the bedroom! However, this is a tough one; the golden rule often does not work in the area of sex. What you most want may not be anything like what she wants, and giving you what she wants probably would not thrill you. How do you set a standard when sex is so different for any two people, and very different for men and women?
How about this: Sex should be enjoyable and deeply satisfying for both of you. Yes, that’s a pretty high standard, but I am convinced it is both right and obtainable.
The first trick is to understand that you may not define enjoyable and satisfying the same way she does. In general, men are more about the physical side of sex, while women are more about the emotional and relational aspects. To be fully satisfied, you both need all of it, but as you grow into a great sex life you will probably initially be more focused on the physical pleasure than she will. We’ve had plenty of women tell us they sometimes find non-orgasmic sex to be very enjoyable and satisfying, but it’s rare to hear a man say the same. So, find out what she wants to get out of sex. If she says she wants more orgasms, then work at that, but if she talks about more cuddling after or looking into each other’s eyes while you make love, then accept that this is what she is after right now. Work at what she says she wants, and keep checking with her. As you become accomplished in one area, she will want more in other areas. You can in a similar way share with her what you want her to work on.
Another very important issue is for neither of you to get too far ahead. If you are loving sex, and she is not enjoying it at all, the imbalance is going to become a problem. The solution to this is to put much more effort into working on what is important to the one who is not enjoying as much or not feeling as satisfied. This means being willing to hold off on what you want to add if you are enjoying sex more right now. If it’s okay for you, and not good for her, don’t tell her about the new position you want to try, or how much you want oral. It’s not that what you want is wrong, but rather that you need to sacrifice for the sake of your joint sex life. Don’t get so far ahead of her that she feels sex is just for you and she will never enjoy it. Back off a bit, focus on her, and give her time to develop a desire for and ability to enjoy sex. Trust me; what you can have in the future is worth the wait!
The worst part about being away from my bride was not having her there when I woke up in the morning. I think both of us miss that more than anything (including sex, and we both like sex!).
Because we work from home, and because we have a good deal of flexibility when we do things (as long as they get done) we rarely have to set an alarm and jump (or fall, or crawl) out of bed as soon as it goes off. We have enjoyed this luxury, and our morning snuggle time has become very important to both of us. On the rare occasions we need to set an alarm, we generally add fifteen minutes for laying together – even when that means fifteen minutes less sleep. In the big picture, that morning connecting time is far more important to our mental, emotional and physical health than the sleep could ever be.
Might a few minutes of morning snuggle time be a good thing for you and your bride? Give it a try on weekends or during a vacation, and see how you each like it. If it’s a good thing for both of you, think about going to bed a bit earlier so you can wake up a bit earlier and have morning connecting time.
Some morning when you wake up before both the alarm and your wife, turn off the alarm and wake her with a slow, gentle massage. No pressing in, just run your hands over her body, gently stroking one area a few times, then moving on to another. Don’t say anything, just feed her some morning oxytocin!
As it warms up (for those in the northern part of the world), her wanting to be close to you can be negatively impacted. You can make closeness more likely by being sure you not smelly or sweaty. A fan can also make closeness a lot nicer – a ceiling fan over the bed can be a great investment.
Teach your children to respect your privacy when you’re in your bedroom with the door closed. Around here we say “if there’s no blood or fire, don’t knock.” Of course there are other valid reasons to bother mom and dad, but the kids should know a closed door is not to be taken lightly.
Once you ensure bedroom privacy, make a point of retreating there with your wife from time to time. It’s amazing what ten minutes of laying together talking can do for you. Or ten minutes of silent hugging. Or a quick massage. And if you train the kids to leave you alone…
BTW: A friend who had a “fire only” rule (he said with three boys blood was common) was once interrupted (during sex yet) by a lot of door banging and yelling. When he opened the door, he only got out “Where’s …” before he saw the smoke! (The only real damage was to the mood!)
The worst part about being away from my bride was not having her there when I woke up in the morning. I think both of us miss that more than anything (including sex, and we both like sex!).
Some morning when you wake up before both the alarm and your wife, turn off the alarm and wake her with a slow, gentle massage. No pressing in, just run your hands over her body, gently stroking one area a few times, then moving on to another. Don’t say anything, just feed her some morning oxytocin!