Going the Distance

Posted on June 8th, 2015

There are few things in life in which I presume to consider myself an expert.  One of them is Diet Coke taste testing.  Another is motivating yourself to work out.  The third is surviving a long distance relationship.

This was never something in which I wanted to be an expert.  Occasionally, I hear people glamorize long distance dating with talk of love letters and romantic airport reunions.  These people are delusional.  There is nothing enchanting about not being able to hold your significant other’s hand when they have a bad day.  It’s just not that fun when you have to yet again decide whether to find a platonic date for your sorority formal, or just to go stag.

Ian and I have been dating since 2009, and dated long distance from September 2010-May 2015 (we were together for a few summers, though).  Someone showed me the statistics on distance relationships in 2011– it wasn’t pretty.  Our strategies have evolved a bit through the years, but I think a couple of key tenets really saw us through.  Allow me to share my advice into the abyss:

1. Remember you’re complete on your own.  Have your own friends, your own passions.  Don’t sit around waiting for the next phone call, or the next visit.  You can’t be happy if you’re not finding fulfillment outside of your relationship, and you can’t be in a healthy relationship if you’re not personally happy.  (This applies to all relationships, actually!)
2. Don’t miss the big moments.  You can’t be there for all of them, but you’ll feel more connected if you share memories of the major ones.
3. Prioritize visits.  Schedule them, plan your spending so that you can afford them, and keep them frequent and consistent whenever possible.  Since January 2011, Ian and I have only once gone more than a month without seeing one another.
4. Align on communication expectations.  For me us, this meant a lot of talking.  I didn’t want to be a stranger in Ian’s life.  I wanted to feel like I was a part of his day, even if that just meant being able to visualize where he was and what was on his plate.  We texted fairly consistently throughout the day, and tried to Facetime or talk every night.  Different couples have different strategies here, but it made it easier for us to be together when we didn’t have to spend all of our time explaining basic facts.
5. Face the tough conversations head on.  It can be tempting when you’re not together often to just make sure things are calm and perfect in the limited time you have with one another, but if you’re spending years apart, it would be artificial to prolong meaningful progress in a relationship (and everyone knows important conversations should be had in person).  I would always apologize to Ian if and when we had to have a tough conversation because I didn’t want him to feel like I came in town to ambush him, but the fact that we’ve had so much transparency and really addressed a range of issues makes me feel a lot more comfortable now that our relationship is genuine and mature.

This stuff is hard, but when it’s worth it, you want to work for it.  If you find yourself avoiding the work, it might be a sign that it is time to reevaluate.  Good luck, love birds, near and far!