Love is a fantastic thing and it can inspire you to do great things. When you are in love it can make you feel like the strongest and most confident person in the world. But what happens when the love comes crashing down around you, just like everyone said it would, and does this have to happen?
I am a twenty two year old guy. I detest the fact that I have had to become a statistic supporting the view that long distance relationships don't work. I spent last year studying in the U.S. as an international student. Typically I met the girl of my dreams, fell in love and thought I was going to live happily ever after. Like everyone else, that has experienced this type of scenario, I returned home to my native land to be greeted with skepticism about my new love.
It was not that my friends or family doubted that I had met someone special. Nor was it that they had any dislike for her. It was simply logical to them that this was nothing more than a holiday romance. It was widely believed that after a couple of weeks apart we would go our separate ways. This was not the case.
You see in the modern world we have opportunities to go anywhere and do anything. The world is constantly changing and evolving, why should we expect to be greeted by our soul-mate right on our doorstep? Hundreds of thousands of people worldwide never will find "the one." The fact is that if you think you have found something special, distance shouldn't even be an issue; and it isn't.
For those who take the decision to "make it work" they do so with obvious good intent. I can't speak for everyone, but I can speak for myself and the people I know when I say that cheating isn't an option. You don't decide to go through a long distance relationship to be with someone you could cheat on. If you could, why would you need to be with them?
Cheating was never a concern during my year apart from my other half. I trusted her, and I still would. Unfortunately other things come into the equation. Things that you don't think have much of an impact; but they do. The first time that you see your partner again, after so many months apart, is the most amazing feeling in the world. It is almost as if you have been living without a heart for the last few months. In that first moment when you see them again your heart beats like never before. All the feelings come rushing back, and you remember exactly why you were staying in the relationship in the first place…if you had forgotten!
Everything you do together feels like doing it again for the first time. Not because it is awkward, far from it, but just because it has that added spark to it. The good times are great, and they implant strong memories and feelings in the mind of your loved one that should help you pull through your next time apart. Unfortunately, it isn't as simple as this.
As great as the good times are; the bad times are bad too. The smallest of arguments, and they do happen no matter how much you have missed your loved one, will serve only to create concern in your relationship in the future. When you are thousands of miles apart, and times are tough, the minor niggles you had the last time you were together are magnified tenfold to create confusion and concern in an already fragile environment.
The worst thing you can do in any relationship, but even more-so in a long distance relationship, is take your loved one for granted. The moment you start doing this you are doomed. No matter how close you are, or how much you love each other, you can never know exactly what your other half is thinking; especially if you are not with them.
My advice to anyone thinking about trying to make their relationship last, through the distance, is make your time apart as minimal as you can. Long distance relationships can work, but the longer you are apart the more difficult it becomes and the bigger risk you are taking.
So should we even bother entering into a long distance relationship in the first place when, according to what everyone will tell you, they apparently won't last? My answer is yes. If you care strongly enough for that special someone to be willing to give it that fighting chance, and they feel the same, then there is always a possibility that you will make it through. And if someone cared about you strongly enough to go through it in the first place, those feelings don't just disappear overnight.
My girlfriend and I had spent eight months apart before we finally fell foul of fate. It is easy to forget why you are in the relationship when times get tough and your other half is not there to help you through it. Unfortunately I had to return home to complete my final year at college, and then work to save money, before I could return to America. My girlfriend was younger than me and also had to finish college, so she could not move to my country either.
It is difficult when you care so much for someone and you just wish you could be with them there and then. But going through the kind of commitment a long distance relationship brings has to count for something, and in the end; that is all that matters. I know that my ex-girlfriend cares for me, and vice-versa, and maybe one day we will be able to be together. If we hadn't tried the long distance relationship, and shown each other that we cared that much, then we never would have got there anyway.
My verdict: long distance relationship - give it a go, the rewards could be worth it in the end.
