If you are in a marriage with mismatched sex drives, it’s imperative to understand about love languages. That’s why not long ago I wrote “Why Knowing Your Low Drive Wife’s Love Language Is Important.”
Speaking a person’s “love language,” is also known as making “deposits into the love bank.” It’s an action that helps your mate feel cherished and in turn creates a bond where they crave to reciprocate for you.
(However, it’s bad form to give so you will get! Giving without expecting anything in return is called love. It’s an added bonus that the reciprocal nature of love and generosity can include an amazing blessing.)
But, what about when we are acting badly?
There is less discussion about the flip side of this “deposit coin.” The opposite of deposits are withdrawals. Withdrawals are things that make subtractions. In a relationship, withdrawals are bad interactions. It means you are no longer speaking a love language, but a destructive language. This destructive language kills sexual interest. [See What is Sexual Interest? Why Should I Care?]
Unfortunately, the effect withdrawals have on a person is greater than a deposit. In other words, one withdrawal equals five deposits in the strength of affect they have on a person, according to the Gottman Institute.
When I was a teen, I trained as a classical pianist. My teacher drilled into my head that if I made a mistake in a stanza, I had to play that stanza correctly 11 times to erase the negative effect the mistake would make on my muscle memory. Although 11 times is more than 5, I think you can see the correlation.
The purpose of this post is to make you aware of bad interactions and help you start considering where these things might be happening in your marriage.
“…but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal,” 1 Corinthians 13:1.
These negative interactions are labeled different things by different psychologists.
Dr. Willard Harley has identified 6 bad interactions.
He calls them Love Busters. Check out the links for explanations and prescriptions for helping overcome them.
They are:
Angry Outbursts – self-explanatory.
Selfish Demands – demanding your spouse think and act in a certain way without giving their opinion any consideration.
Disrespectful Judgements – many condescending behaviors are included in this.
Independent Behavior – living life as if you don’t have a spouse, making plans without even notifying your spouse.
Dishonesty – self-explanatory.
Annoying Habits – things your spouse does that drives you crazy and are easily fixed.
Dr. John Gottman has identified 4 bad interactions.
He calls them the four horsemen of the apocalypse. They are:
Criticism
Contempt
Defensiveness
Stonewalling
They are described in this video:
The main take-away from this post is negative interactions outweigh good interactions.
You can’t hold water in a leaky bucket. You may keep pouring the water of love in, but it’s not going to make a difference if you keep shooting holes in the bucket with bad behavior.
What is a simple solution?
If you are consistently exploding with anger, demanding your own way, or being patronizing, no amount of love language deposits can overtake the consequence of those withdrawals. Sexual interest isn’t going to grow in a mismatched marriage if either of you are acting like jerks.
That’s why I am adamant that the most effective aphrodisiac is building a better friendship with your spouse. Friends are thoughtful and kind toward one another. They intentionally work to eliminate bad interactions and stay connected. [See Work of the Heart]
