Okay, so I’m asking for relationship advice on a message board…this is what the world has come to.
I started seeing a girl recently (we’ve been on several dates and regularly e-mail and are now starting to phone each other up), but she lives an hour away from me. Now, I know that it isn’t THAT far away, but it does do away with spontinaeity and makes ever date a planned event. So far everything been pretty okey-dokey and I’ve spent the night at her place three times (once on the couch, twice with her…but no hanky-panky yet, just some heavy petting). Now she’s made the suggestion that she come stay at my place next time, which is fine with me, but this seems to be a sealing the deal kind of offer to me.
The main question I have is this: “Have you ever been in an out-of-town relationship and if so what advice can you offer?”
I think this ones a keeper, and I really don’t want to screw this one up, so any help I can get would be greatly appreciated.
It doesn’t totally wipe out spur of the moment things, its just makes them really difficult. A lot more effort.
My experiance the distance limited anything to weekends pretty much, so there were a lot of days of not seeing each other. It losened everything up a lot, but if you are possesive or jealous its going to get really rocky. You cannot keep tabs on someone when you can’t get to them every instant. Any time she needs you or you need her there is going to be at least an hour of waiting until they can get there. Get patient and understanding now.
Other than that, its not a big deal. Once you get the way your lives fit together it becomes amazing how much time you can actually spend together, how much you can just show up on an unplanned night and make it work. (If you do this and they aren’t there, don’t flip. Failures happen, and its not thier fault or yours…it may be a lot of lost time and effort, chalk it up to the cost of doing business.)
At first I thought this thread was going to be about the “dreaded Rear Admiral” of Milhouse VanHousen fame.
But alas…
But I do have some advice! I’m currently in a similar relationship. With the addition of the fact that we’ve been together for over 7 months. And that we live 3 hours away from each other. It was the worst of all possible scenarios: We met at a bar (neither of us really picks up at bars), she took me home (never done that with a stranger, for either of us), and we’ve been dating since.
We didn’t have sex, just the same situation as you. Every weekend together was a planned event, where a lot of the mystery and romance gets sucked out. So we really had to work on maintaining a sense of “wooing” each other. That is the most important thing I can tell you. I know you don’t take the relationship for granted, but since you’ll be in close quarters so often, its easy to slip into this rut. DON’T DO IT! Keep it as romantic as possible, and don’t assume or take anything for granted. Make your intentions clear, whatever they are. And since when you do see each other, its for long stretches of time, be completely honest. Many times you’ll need some time alone, or just some quiet time. Don’t be afraid to ask for it, and make sure she’s comfortable asking for it as well.
I guess that I’ve got a little different take on things. I met a girl while I was studying in Italy in mid '97. We traveled together, fooled around, had a great time, and began falling in love. The kicker was that we had to go back to our respective schools in the US once our studies in Italy were over. The real kicker was that she was going to KU and I was going to Clemson (SC if you didn’t know).
Well, we continued our relationship long distance with plane tickets and phone calls and the like. She finally moved to AL for a job and I followed once I graduated. All those months of being far apart were well worth it. Being together all the time was great.
We’ve been married just over a month now. I can’t imagine what my life would have been like if I had figured it wasn’t worth the trouble.
Basically, try to keep things exciting all the time (or as often as you can) and NOT just when you are together. Be trusting, it is easy not to be when you are so far from each other.
Thanks for the advice guys. I’m not jealous, and I think I can trust her, so thankfully that’s not a concern. I just hope I can manage not to make an ass of myself during the chunks of time we spend together.
