Love does not need language, because no matter if we say “I love you”, “I love you” or “Je t’aime”, we feel it. But what happens when you fall head over heels in someone who speaks a language other than your own? Can love work with three languages? And does a bilingual relationship cause difficulties? I share my experiences with you.
Bilingual Relationship: How does love work with three languages?
Every beginning is hard
When I met my partner in France, we exchanged only 3 words. In English. A few hours later I got a message on Facebook, if I am well. By him. In English. Of course, I understood what he wrote and without much trouble we exchanged the first news. But I quickly realized that my English was more than rusty. For years I did not speak a single word, because there was simply no situation in which I needed it. And even less did I need my school French all these years. I had a real language handicap. But with every message I got from him or sent to him, I became more and more secure. If I did not know a word, I searched it in the www. When we met in Ibiza a month later, suddenly everything was gone. There was my dream type and I could not say a word. I had a speech handicap. I wanted to talk, but I could not, for fear of making a mistake. So at first I preferred to be silent and let someone else talk for me. With every day and the habit of having to speak English, my barrier subsided.
Bilingual Relationship: Difficulties?
Today, more than two years later, English is fluently spoken, written and quarreled at home. We live in France and my French is more bad than right. I understand a lot, can write well, but still have a language handicap. In addition, I speak only German in the job and it is easier for us both to speak English. Of course, I would like to speak French fluently and perfectly, but I and others from my environment do not put pressure on me because we all understand each other. By “everyone” I mean my partner and his family. This is important for me and there are official or doctor’s courses where no English is spoken and I stand like a dork next to my partner who speaks for me, so to speak, a minor role. That’s nothing that affects our relationship,
The only difficulty lies in the detail, in the dot on the i, which one can never express in a foreign language as in the native language. This sometimes leads to misunderstandings or to the fact that you can never express yourself in a dispute as you might like it. But perhaps the difficulty is also a decisive advantage, the bilingual relationship with a monolingual brings with it. Because in details are often problems that can make something more complicated than it actually is.
What only bilingual couples know
In a bilingual relationship everyone has their mother tongue and then there is the language spoken. But couples with multiple languages usually develop their own fourth language. A mix of all three languages, a unique pair language that only belongs to the couple, creating an incredible sense of intimacy. The initial language challenges also make you grow together a lot and write your very own story of learning that love does not need language.
