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Taken from: http://www.thesoko.com/thesoko/article1656.html


Life takes us in many directions. You may end up travelling or living in another city or country outside of your native one and, in this case, it is inevitable that you will meet many new people. Conversely, you may encounter individuals who are from foreign cities or lands and are living in your home territory. Regardless of the situation, fate has this funny way of making us fall in love with people who don’t always live where we do and we still choose to be in relationships with them, albeit remotely. I won’t mince words. Long distance relationships are trying, fraught with challenges and require intense effort. But they are also oh-so-wonderful sometimes. Here’s a survival guide if you find yourself with a remote boyfriend or girlfriend.

1) Trust Issues
Trust is a crucial element to any relationship. In long distance ones, trust is indescribably important. Prior to plunging into a long distance relationship, you need to ensure that you can trust not only your partner, but also trust yourself to remain faithful when the two of you are separated. Being apart doesn’t mean you can’t have fun. In fact, that’s what you should be indulging in as much as possible.

So remember to have a life. Innocently flirt if it tickles your fancy. But know where to draw the line. If you’re going to resort to your single gal ways or transform into a sleazy bachelor on the weekends, you’re creating a surefire recipe for relationship disaster. If you know that’s where it’s headed, it’s better to split up, rather than continue in a relationship riddled with deception.

2) Communicate
Normally, when two people decide to make a commitment to each other to become serious, processes within that exclusive relationship become more structured. Saturday nights spent together are more established, dates for social functions are more automated and the two of you are likely to be in contact with each other on a daily basis. In a long distance relationship, that last aspect is heightened at least tenfold. Because you don’t have the luxury of seeing each other every day, or perhaps even every month, it becomes necessary to ensure that emails, text messages and a telephone call become mandatory every day. Don’t forget that this is going to replace dinner and drinks in terms of getting to know more about your partner, so the quality of the communication is imperative as well. Be sure to tell your sweetie what is going on in your life and take a genuine interest in what is occurring in his or her

3) Relationship RRSP
Just as regular contributions to your RRSP portfolio will yield growth over time (albeit with forecasted gains and losses), so will investing in your long distance relationship. If the two of you love each other enough to want to be together despite the distance, you need to take it that extra kilometre and make the effort to see each other on a reasonably regular basis. Depending on where your sweetie lives, this may translate to expensive domestic or even international flights, which may mean your vacation time at work may be entirely devoted to the relationship. Consequently, you may have to sacrifice time allocated for other holidays.

A boyfriend and I once lived 3.5 hours apart by train. Every other weekend, we would take turns going to each other’s cities. If one person couldn’t make it to see the other because he or I needed to stay in town, the other person would visit, but would have their train trip paid for by the other person. Having a fixed schedule may sound like a drag and ridiculously unromantic, but adhering to a structure did ensure that neither of us became lazy or lost interest in the relationship.

4) Back to the Future
Unlike a local relationship, which can be for fun and games, I strongly believe that a long distance relationship should only be entered into by parties who are mutually serious about each other. A contractual obligation, if you may. Examining the situation rationally, eventually the two of you will be together geographically in the long-term. You need to be honest about this.

If he lives in a different country, will he move to be with you or vice versa? If she’s in a different province, will the two of you marry? You also need to consider such extenuating factors such as nationality/citizenship, employment opportunities and access to family and friends. If your sweetheart is moving to be with you, you need to have a heightened sensitivity to what that person is leaving behind. As a result, you may need to assist him or her in finding a job, introduce him or her to your circle of family and friends and thoroughly reinforce that your partner is a complete part of your life.


Close To You

Not everyone is fortunate enough to find the love of their life across the street from them. Otherwise, we’d all be dating our neighbours. But despite the difficulties and the occasional loneliness, long distance love can be refreshingly rewarding and fulfilling. The key point to remember is to keep it real; as you don’t see the person 'live' every day, you may not get to see all of their nuances. But with time and some elbow grease, you may discover that the person is the best in the world. Wherever they are.

Excellent article! My boyfriend lives about two hours away by car. But the issue is that neither my parents nor his parents like us to travel. My parents think that he's a waste of my time and that I should end it, as do his. He's never met my parents and I've never met his.

We still live with our parents, seeing as how we're still young and neither of us drive. And my parents are very overprotective and have told me time and time again that they don't trust me to be alone with a boy, even though I have shown them otherwise.

I love my boyfriend with all my heart and they're not making it, nor trying to make it, any easier for us to see each other.

Yeah, my mom doesn't want me to go anywhere near this kid alone. So, that's a no.

I really like this article.
I was in a long distance relationship for a year and 7 months. (I live in Cali, he lived in Hawaii)

It was AMAZING while it lasted.
Seeing him the few times I did made everything a lot more meaningful.
Every kiss meant more.

In the end he was the one that broke it off.
It's hard to maintain a stable long distance relationship when you get really busy like he did.

Excellent article.

My own relationship has been predominately (about 3 years out of 4) long-distance, with varying degrees of distance (2min walk to 11 time zones), and everything that article has to say is true. You need trust, you need communication, and need to be willing to invest a certain degree of time, energy, money, and commitment into the relationship if you want it to work out.