I Was Spoiled With Love

The 5 Love Languages and how love should travel

Our house is filled with the energy five kids deliver. The hustle and heart of constant movement.

My sister Christine snatches me out of the bassinet. At fifteen, she is forever scooping me into her arms.

“Christine put her down you’re going to spoil her!” says my mother. She tinkers in the kitchen while the aroma of one of her trademark meals saturates our house.

Christine hugs me tightly, spins around, and replies,“You can’t spoil a baby with love.”

My mother told that story over and over with a smile.

Obviously proud to raise a child who recognized the potency of love.

Our mother’s love was strong and generous.

In fact, years ago, when I read Gary Chapman’s, The 5 Love Languages, I was amazed to realize my mom used all five. She was undeniably extravagant with her affection.

The 5 Love Languages, is a fascinating exploration of ‘The Language’ which makes you feel most loved.

Is it…

Words of affirmation?

Acts of service - actions of love?

Receiving gifts?

Spending quality time with someone?

Is it physical, i.e., hugs?

I lost my mom when I was only 28.

When I become a mother, I am grateful this glorious relationship returns to my world. Even if it is reciprocal and I am now the leader of love.

One day we are having dinner with my in-laws. My boys are toddlers and I keep getting up to retrieve something else my little guys need.

I slip into my chair and say, “I wish my mom was still here so I could thank her.”

I had so much more to tell her. And having my own children reinforces these thoughts and that love even more.

My mother-in-law, not one to mince words, shakes her head in disgust. “You were spoiled,” she says. “And it wasn’t just that mother of yours it was all those siblings as well.”

Her words sting and stun me, leaving me temporarily frozen.

Certainly, as the youngest of five, I have been spoiled in many ways. But my mom raised us alone after our dad left.

This meant we needed to help with household tasks and hold jobs from a young age.

I babysat a family of children in the summer starting at age eleven. At fourteen, I took a job at a kennel affiliated with a local veterinary office. At the age of nineteen, I began working for the government while I continued at the kennel on weekends.

I paid for my expenses during high school, my college education and bought my first car.

Yes, I had been spoiled, but I’d been raised with great responsibility. My mother-in-law’s comments were troubling.

Why was my mother-in-law so annoyed with the way I was raised?

In a word? Love. My family expressed love in all the 5 and then some.

We are likely to surprise one another with a gift no holiday necessary.

Cards will find a way to the mailbox for no other reason than that you are loved.

We throw hugs and “I love you” around like sand in the summer.

We are likely to show up with a candy bar just because it’s your favorite.

We take joy in any chance to be together.

It is our mother, Rosemarie, an Irish girl from Brooklyn who taught us this.

When “love pours generously into you, it can help, but spill over into the others, we meet.”

Love had been lavishly handed down to her too.

My grandfather, a New York City Policeman had a heart so big his body could barely house it.

During the depression, he refused to evict his tenant who had lost their job. My grandmother and grandfather eventually lost their Brooklyn brownstone. They never owned another home. For my Grandpa, it meant he had done the right and loving thing.

Don’t misunderstand me. My family is not perfect. I think that falls somewhere under Irish Catholic rule.

We are human and have the same complicated imperfections of any family. I’m okay with that. Nothing is learned from perfection.

We do; however, have no shortage of love.

I remember during a particularly difficult time in my marriage, my friend asked if I had told my brother and sisters. “No,” I said. “If my family thought I needed them they would all be on my doorstep by morning.”

Our mom didn’t need an excuse to, “Let love travel.”

It might be my favorite candy or a sweater waiting in my room.

Love notes could pop up anywhere.

And then there were the looks, the hugs, and the words.

With every fiber of her being, she made it clear we were her greatest joy.

I’ve never known anything else.

Years after that dinner comment, we sit with my in-laws.

Once again, those words spring from my mother-in-law’s lips.

“You were spoiled,” she says.

This time I am ready.

“You’re right,” I reply. “I was spoiled with love.”