February 7, 2001

Well, it’s that time of the year again. Valentine’s Day is coming. The malls are filled with huge red hearts. And the card shops are doing a big business. This is a time to demonstrate our caring.

In our workshops we discuss the differences between love and affection. The parents usually define love as the feeling we have for another person. And that affection is the way in which we show or demonstrate that feeling of love. Three ways in which we demonstrate our love:

It would seem logical that if we loved a person some 30 pounds worth then we would show that person 30 pounds of affection. But that’s not how it works.

In my counseling practice when I do couples counseling I usually ask the husband if he loves his wife. He usually replies that he certainly does. Then I ask him how he demonstrated his love this week. I then hear a lot of fumbling and then get a reply like, "She knows I love her. We’ve been married almost l4 years." In turn I ask the wife if she loves her husband and I usually get the same reply.

When I ask her how she demonstrated her love for him this week I usually get more fumbling. "He knows I love him. We’ve been married close to l4 years." Affection is like the evidence of your love. And without that evidence it’s difficult for people to know if they are really loved.

One of the parents in the workshop told us about her neighbor who spent hours telling her about her own son’s achievements. She would bring over his report cards and go over every grade just glowing with pride. She would bring pictures of him and point out his accomplishments. This mother kept a scrapbook and reels and reels of videotape featuring her son. This mother told her over and over how important he was to her and how much she loves her son.

But as soon as this superboy was in his mother’s sight the mother would begin to scream at him. She threatened, she insulted, she criticized and would finally send him into the house for some type of punishment. As her boy entered his house for punishment his mother would pick up where she left off telling the world what a great son she had.

But, unfortunately, the son never heard a word of this praise from his mother. He only heard her criticism, her insults and her threats. This mother loved her son more than l000 pounds worth. And unfortunately showed him no evidence of her love.

Based on her son’s lack of evidence how much do you think he felt loved? Mom told the world what a great kid he was. But guess who needed to hear this evidence?

Another parent I worked with told me of a similar experience she had as a child. When I saw her she was 35 years old, very talented and very successful. But miserable. She told me about her many achievements and success in school and in the community. But she said she never received validation of any of her success from her parents. No matter how high she achieved, her parents never acknowledged her success.

Her parents had recently spent the week with her. And during their stay they began to talk about how proud they were to be her parents. The parents went over all of her childhood accomplishments in glowing detail. For the first time this 35 year-old mother heard her parents telling her how much they admired what she had done as a child in school.

Her parents told her how they would stay up late at night after she went to bed and talk for hours about being blessed with a special, gifted child. And how lucky they were to be her parents.

You would think that the mother would be thrilled to finally hear her parents validate her success. But she told me she was furious when they told her. The mother told me that all through school she worked so hard to be successful and she was.

But because she thought she didn’t please her parents the success without the validation of her parents made her feel not valued and miserable. And here she was at 35 years of age. Very successful in so many ways. But still miserable.

Most of us seem to be able to care about people close to us. And most of us seem to be able to tell ourselves how much we care about that person. But many of us have such trouble telling or showing that person the caring. And when you don’t show the evidence of caring, that person is never going to know that you really care.