I’m sure I’ll be saying this the rest of my life so don’t be surprised if you hear this from me again.  I’m still a little amazed by how much I have learned about love these last 2 1/2 years since David Glasser, my son who was a Phoenix Police Officer, was killed in the line of duty.

I’ve been on earth quite awhile and I’m a believer, a wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister and a friend, so I thought I knew a quite a about love.  But I had never before experienced the ‘magic’ that can happen when people love each other in the middle of a tragedy that has blown all of our lives apart.

It has convinced me that love is the answer.   Love is supernatural.

I’m surprised that there is so much more to love that I thought.  I’ve studied love – our love for each other and God’s love.  One of the books I read, “The 5 Love Languages” by Gary Chapman helped me learn how to improve in how I show love to my husband, my children and other important people in my life.  If you haven’t read it, you’re missing out on some very helpful information.

We have different ‘love languages’.  I had figured out my love language all on my own early in my marriage.  My husband was great at saying, “I love you” but I often didn’t feel very loved when he didn’t help me with the laundry or cleaning or emptying the dishwasher.  So I told him that he could say he loved me all he wanted, but I didn’t ‘feel’ it unless he was also helping me with all these other things.  I’m glad to say that he got much better at helping me and I began to feel his love.  Later, when I read this book, I realized my love language is ‘Acts of Service”.

What I hadn’t figured out before reading the book was the fact that other people have different love languages.  After I read it, I realized my husband had two love language – Words of Affirmation and Quality Time.  So I adjusted my behavior to try to make sure he was feeling loved as well.

What is significant is the fact that, before reading this book, I thought he felt love like I did so I did things to show I loved him.  I helped him out as much as I could.  That was fine, but that’s not how he felt loved.  He felt loved when he spent time with me and when I point out good things about him with words.

We miss the mark when we show love the same way we feel love.  We are all different.

And our children are different.  I realized one of Davey’s love languages was ‘Receiving Gifts’ when he was about 7 or 8 years-old.  Gifts at his birthday and Christmas were very important to him.  He studied the gifts under the Christmas tree, counting them and trying to figure out what they were.  I was not surprised last weekend when I found Micah, Davey’s son, doing the same thing in front of my Christmas tree.  Similar personalities often have similar love languages.

“Receiving Gifts’ was just one of Davey’s love languages – it was a visual representation of people’s love for him.  This love language was more prominent when he was young.  As he grew older, his other love language of ‘ Quality Time’ became more obvious.  Davey led a very busy life spending time with people he loved.  He was always planning the next trip, the next tailgate, the next party – whatever it took for him to spend time with people he loved.

If he loved you, you knew it.

Let’s all make that our goal this Christmas – to make sure the people we love know and feel that we love them.

Miss you, Davey.

#8144loveyou

Here are some pictures of Davey’s 16th Birthday party.  The party was obviously “mom’s” idea.  Even though everyone was a little ‘too cool’ for a birthday party, Davey loved being surrounded by his friends.