My wife and I are extremely compatible in so many dimensions of life, and yet we have enough differences in us to keep things interesting. A while back, we took our love languages test, and while our number two and number three are shared, her number 1 (words of affirmation) was my number five!

I’ve struggled throughout our relationship and try and find opportunities to comment on how she looks or some thing really nice that she did or qualities I see in her, and I can see her light up when I do that with a little more regularity. However, there are other dimensions, particularly in our romantic relating together, .

Sometimes I have to push myself really hard to speak what’s in my mind. However, she’ll often comment that she wants to feel more passion behind my words. Sometimes I perceive this is almost her asking me to be a different person. I know she’s had some Latin American boyfriends that just knew how to speak with that passion and energy, the same way that they knew how to dance, and well, I can eek out some words here and there, she wants to feel more ‘energy’ and ‘passion’ behind it. I’ll joke with her that I need to put on a zero mask and come through the window with a rose in my mouth lol. But seriously, over the time, this inability to convey my romantic passion towards her using words (which is my number FIVE!!) has caused quite a bit of doubt and insecurity on my behalf as to whether I’ll ever be able to deliver the lines that’ll make her body quiver.

We’ve tried to get by by making little improvements, and I try and use my words as best I can (she often thanks me for those things I say to her, and especially days in which I really make sure to verbalize my enjoyment of her person), but in this particular department, I just feel kind of hopeless!

I really do want to get better and improve my ability to speak her love language, and convey the passionate love that I feel for her in words, but I can’t help but feel like she wishes I was someone else, which is not bode well for connection in this department (neither does feeling insecure around it).

Are there any resources or recommendations surrounding the process of trying to improve the way you speak your partner’s love language? I’ve tried to do it as best I can, but I can’t help but feel that, as it is my number five, I’m still pretty clumsy about it, and what I think is a lot of words, she probably perceives as barely scratching the surface!

So here I am in this Reddit asking for any help or assistance the community could provide! I wish there were some exercises our practices or things that I could do to develop my ability to deliver those words. She’s so desperately desires! I feel that going it alone is still coming up pretty short for me and I really don’t want to just give up!

Any help or assistance the community can provide, or suggest, is much appreciated!