A
male
age
30-35,
anonymous
writes:Me and my girlfriend have been going out for 10 months. We met in college, both first years, and we were in a relationship pretty quickly. She's my first girlfriend, and I'm her second boyfriend.We are really compatible, as we have the same sense of humor, so we get along pretty well. We've had a few problems throughout the year, trying to figure out if we actually did love each other or not. It seemed like her intuition made her feel that it actually wasn't a good relationship. I disagreed. However, we worked those issues out, and we felt better than ever. It's been two months since we've last seen each other, for summer break. We already made plans to visit her house, and that trip is coming up very soon. We've been having problems with the long distance making us feel disconnected from each other. We talk to each other online everyday, for hours and hours. Sometimes we wouldn't have much to say, because our summers haven't been super-exciting, so we chalked it up to just that. I don't think that that is necessarily a problem, by the way, because we truly had been talking a lot. At nights, we'd talk on the phone for a bit before going to bed. We've basically become like best friends.Recently, we've both felt like we weren't very close to each other, romantically. We mostly just talked about mundane things, like our daily lives and such. Occasionally we'd talk about sex, and what we'd like to do to each other once we saw each other again, and we both enjoyed that. However, we both get the feeling that the other person has become just another friend that we talk to online. It seems, without the physical aspect (not just sex, but just hanging out in person and dates and everything), we've drifted apart as a couple. We still really care about each other, but we aren't sure how that's different than how we feel about our other close friends.To her (and I agree somewhat), love shouldn't be something that goes away just because you can't see someone in person, especially after just two months. But this is what happened to us. Today, we just talked about theoretically breaking up, and neither of us was very affected. We felt disconnected from each other, so it didn't seem like a big change to go from going-out status to just being friends that talk online. Nothing would change at that moment. We talked about it some more, and it seemed like the relationship might actually not have going that well, because we felt so disconnected with each other. When we finally realized that it could really be happening, we both did get upset, so perhaps we are not THAT disconnected, right?Perhaps we might just be destined to be really good friends, and that we just mistook our feelings for love. At the same time, I have no idea what love really means. I associate it with feeling close to someone, but I don't see how you can feel close to someone, romantically, without being with them. So now apparently I don't love her anymore, without physical contact. But I feel like I really do care for her, and that I want to be with her. She feels that love is something that should last despite these obstacles. We've had this problem with lack of romance in our relationship, but we fixed it up by going on a few dates or something, and it felt like we were doing really well again. Now this has come up and we have no clue how we feel.So I guess this sounds pretty bad for our relationship, but I'd actually really like to make it work. We are really happy together, and I think that could last. We're just not sure what our current problem means for this relationship. Or maybe we're just being young and naive and inexperienced and don't realize that this isn't actually love. I mean, it's said that if you have to ask if you really love someone, you probably don't. But I don't think love can be so easily explained by that, because that almost sounds like infatuation to me.Can someone explain if long distance should really affect how we feel for each other this much? At the moment, I'd like to at least stay together with her for a little bit more, and see if seeing each other will fix everything. But the problem still remains: if we can feel disconnected from each other after this period of time, do we really love each other?Thanks very much for reading this far! :) I'm actually going to show her this question, so she might respond with how she feels.
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best friend, long distance, period Reply to this Question
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Fancy yourself as an agony aunt? Add your answer to this question! A
reader, anonymous, writes (9 July 2009): Wow, agree with Jason so much I give him an A+.
I suggest that you both don't jump into conclusions yet, summer will be over soon and you will see each other again. You might even forget that the separation ever happened once you meet and then will become inseparable.
You just need to be more intimate this time. The sexual aspect of a relationship is essential to your relationship. This is what makes a bf/gf relationship different to that of being just friends who love each other.
So unless you've tried all these suggestions and end up with the same feeling..then get back here and we will discuss that again.
Goodluck!
A
reader, anonymous, writes (9 July 2009): Maybe I would like to see how she feels before I comment, but I guess I will give you the experience you are lacking in my own words.
Firstly you love her. She loves you. That is clear. What you both have is something so rare, that I have only experienced once, to know how rare it is..."it" refers to that grand feeling of always having someone to love you back, someone who makes you feel more "you", the very close connection you both share and being able to be this open with each other about problems. I don't think this is something any friend can give ;) It is the best kind of love.
But I do understand what you mean about the lack of intimacy and the position it has placed both of you. But be thankful you both can talk about it. Sadly in my last relationship, things went off when she couldn't tell me what was wrong because as she said "it was about you" (referring to me). But i felt if she has told me anyway, as hard as it sounded, we'd still be together. If you both share the will to want to make things work, I actually think it can. Anything worth having in this world is hard to keep, like love. Likewise, it is easy to just give up.
But I would say finding love like this is hard to obtain again, not impossible but hard. I would not suggest to break up or have space.
I wish I could give you a sure-fire way to solve the problem, but life hasn't thrown everything at me yet. But I will give you some advice on what I think may help. The next time you both see each other...be intimate. Try to be as intimate as much as possible. You two have talked enough don't u think? But some action into it now. Keep the thoughts of the person you love in your head and always remember why you love that person in the 1st place. Sometimes it is easy to remember the bad things or doubts....our brain loves to do that. But yeah, be intimate, kiss, touch each other etc. Be sexual with each other! Say to yourself that she is drop dead gorgeous, coz she prolly is! Yur a man aren't ya? Well yur woman is waiting for you. And there aint no woman like her.
Long distance is hard, because of the lack of physical. If the relationship is successful, one would tend to have a stronger mental connection with the other than any other relationship he/she has been in.
There are others out there who have been in long distance, so I am sure they will be helpful.
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A
female
reader, ilovebowsandcherries  +, writes (9 July 2009):
 well i don't think it's love because if you're in a long distance relationship and you LOVE eachother then it wouldn't matter how far apart you guys are because you'd always have them in your heart.
now this relationship seems to become more of a friendship and maybe it's time to let the relationship go and see it more as a friendship.
i've noticed you used alot the word "disconnected" i think in some ways you already know that this relationship isn't going to work now as you keep saying you're disconnected from eachother so on and so forth.
because you've had contact via msn or facebook whichever you use that it's grown more to a friendship.
you said you really do care for her maybe it's care now for just a friend and you say you want to be with her but maybe you're afraid to let go as she's your first girlfriend and you're afraid if you let this go that maybe this will be it aka no more contact with her.
but you even said you guys talked about breaking up and weren't that bothered by it but when it was actually going to happen you guys felt a bit sad a bit but not enough to keep the relationship going.
the way i see it if you guys break up you know you'll still be there for eachother (Hopefully) and because you haven't seen eachother for 2 months you know it's not going to be an awkward thing.
so no i don't think it's love i think it's more friendship now.
i hope this helps
x ilovebowsandcherries x :)
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A
male
reader, shane m +, writes (9 July 2009):
Okey makes sense about what your feeling so maybe you could find something you can both connect through, maybe making plans about the future or step it up and try online sex either way if you really love her then you will work it out
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