What kind of gift should I get my significant other for Valentine's Day?

Host: What kind of gift should I get my significant other for Valentine's Day?

Gloria McDonald: This is always a challenge, what is that special gift I should get my significant other for Valentine's Day. When people ask me this, I say, you know what, it is really important for you to understand your partner's love language. Gary Chapman wrote the book 'The Five Love Languages' and I think this is a phenomenal book and I always go back to that. So, some people actually getting a physical gift is really, really important to them and in that case, it is always about not giving them the gift that you want to give them, but giving them the gift that they would want to receive. So for some people gifts are really important, but for lots of other people, receiving an actual physical gift is not the most important thing. So for some people, words of affirmation are really important to them. So if that is your partner's love language, find a way to write them a very special note that tells them, why they are important to you, what you love about them, what you nick about them, why they are so special, write them a poem, find a song that you think is particularly appropriate; but it is words, the words that they need to see, written or hear from you. So for those people, do that. For other people, their love language is quality time spent together. So if your partner really enjoys just spending time with you, then maybe you can give your partner gift certificates to spend. For example, every Tuesday night together and it is not about necessarily doing things together and being active, but it is about spending time where you are one-on-one listening to one another, talking to one another, being quiet together. Sometimes it is about sitting next to each other, watching television together, but spending time together. For other people, physical touch is their love language. So if your partner is very cuddly, touchy feely and maybe you are not so much so, this would be a perfect time for you to step out of your comfort zone and maybe just really spend time with your partner, giving them a massage, being intimate, really spending a lot of time in close physical contact for that evening.

For other people, their love language is acts of service. So you may want to consider what can you do to help your partner out. So maybe you are going to give them a gift certificate to take their dry-cleaning into the dry-cleaners for the next five or six weeks or something like that or find something, maybe something that they needed repaired and you can go get it repaired for them and surprise them; but it is doing something that is usually fairly basic, fairly what most people will consider unromantic, but taking care of something that needs to be done. So doing a service for them, telling them that you will wash the dishes for them for the next four weeks or something like that. Give them gift certificates with those things; do something; it's actually doing something, that's providing a service to them. So, it does not have to be gift, physical gift, but there are all different kinds of ways in which you can give a really special unique gift to your partner if you know them and understand them.