If you ask me, I will tell you I have been in a relationship for 7 years. But is that correct?
I really don’t know. Both my partner and I cannot answer this question because we don’t know when the friendship ended and the relationship started. Cheesy I know.
I can tell you we met on Facebook and had common friends. We hit it off from the start even though we were very different. We became friends quickly. We only met once in the first year. I know by the end of that first year we were together, but how?
No one proposed or asked the other person to be his/her girlfriend/boyfriend. I simply realised I was in a relationship. My first relationship.
We’ve met a handful of times in these seven years. Now we are engaged. We could have met now, but pandemic and quarantine don’t want us to.
Not everything is sunshine and roses, especially in a long-distance relationship. Here are the things we learned along the way (I asked him what he learned and he panicked and thought it was some tricky question):
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The Worst Part of Long-Distance
Imagine fighting on texts. We do that. It is difficult. We talk on the phone and video chats when we can, but texting is the easiest way to talk without everyone in the house hovering over you. Long-distance means there will be more misunderstandings. When you cannot see the other person, sometimes even things said in-joke, can hurt your feelings and which leads to fights.
In this aspect of our relationship, we have, over the years, tried to take my parents’ advice. Do not get angry when the other person is, no matter how unreasonable. We both follow it now, but at the beginning it was so hard. I think it took us 4–5 years to follow this rule. It is so easy to turn a simple thing into a big fight when you are not together. Or even when you are.
Do not get angry at the same time. If you think the other person is being unreasonable, talk to them about it after they have calmed down. You will find out that most often or not the anger is because of something else entirely, not the one you’re currently fighting over. And 90% of the times the angry person will realize their mistake when he/she calms down. That will make your job easier, but do not gloat. I told you so is also your worst enemy.
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The Thing No One Tells You About
I have to have my phone with me all the time so I do not miss him when he calls or texts and vice versa. When there is so much distance separating you (thankfully not time zones) it is hard to feel connected sometimes. One late reply to a text can be interpreted in many ways, especially when the times are bad. If you had a fight, the previous day and reply to his texts after 3 hours, it can create misunderstandings.
When the only thing connecting you and your partner is your cell phone, you hold on to it with your dear life. Hence the cell phone addiction. But now we try to use our phone as little as possible for things other than talking to each other because scrolling through Instagram is always so easy while waiting for a text.
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The Tale as Old as Time
Understanding is the key to every good relationship or friendship. Everyone knows it. We read it in every love related article and hear it from every couple. The harsh truth is it takes time. The more time you spend with each other, the more you talk, the more you understand each other.
There is a thing called instant connection. I will not deny that. But that connection will not make the relationship work long term. Trying and understanding what the other person is feeling or going through is important. Being there for them when they need you, no matter how silly the reason, is also important.
If I had a penny for every time I acted silly and made unreasonable requests, I would be rich. But he knows it and understands my need to talk to him till 3 in the morning over something someone said to me at the office two years ago.
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Compromise Is the Key
We have a lot of similarities in our nature but also a lot of differences. What do we do? We compromise. When we started talking he used to sleep at 10 and I used to sleep at 2. I wanted him to stay awake and he wanted me to improve my life and sleep on time. It seemed unreasonable to me.
But we both compromised. I tried to sleep early but for me that meant midnight. He knew I would be awake till midnight, so he tried to stay awake for some more time so we could talk more. Years later our sleeping schedule has synced along with other habits.
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Change Will Happen
“I will not change for anyone”, they said. It is a lie. The change will happen whether or not you want it. I was 17 when we met and he was 18. I always tell him it’s like we grew up other. Now, we both are 25 years old.
We both have changed in these years and it was for the good. I am a night owl, no more but an early bird. He told me not to trust every person on this planet, and I taught him to trust at least some people on this planet. I taught him the value of sorry and he taught me not to say sorry for everything.
We are still very different, but we are now also somewhat the same.
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The Power of Gestures
When you live together simple gestures like a hug, cooking something they like, picking up flowers or their favourite fruit shows your love. You do not have to say you care about the other person. You show it with your actions and gestures.
When there is so much distance separating you, you do not get that freedom. If I want to send him a fruit, I would have to courier it and it will be rotten by the time it reached him. So we made our own gestures over the year.
When I wake up on my birthday, I know I would have a long text from him waiting and vice versa. He sends me chocolates and I send him cards drawn by me (No. I am not a kid). Texting each other the first thing in the morning and so much more. These are the gestures, little gestures, that we used to show we care. Just saying I love you is not always enough.
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Our Mantra to Avoid Miscommunication
Never stop communicating. I am not saying we talk non-stop. Sometimes we can’t talk for days at a time. What I mean is that when there is so much physical distance between you, it becomes so easy to not talk when you are angry over something. At the beginning of the relationship, this was how we used to roll. But no more.
If you do not talk no one is forcing you to amend things between each other. In a long-distance relationship, not talking will eventually be the end of your relationship. The more you stay silent, the more distance it causes between both of you and ultimately the relationship will end.
Over the years, we have learned that anger is mostly always because of miscommunication. Once we talk things through and see what the other person really wanted to say or what they were expecting makes it easier to solve things between us.
We have gone a whole month once not talking. It did us nothing good and then we realised it will be the cause of our breakup if we do not change this habit and we did.
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It takes patience and compromise, along with love, to make a relationship work. Especially when you can only meet twice a year for mere hours. We never hide things from each other. Over the years, we have become each other family and we love it like this.
Every couple is unique. After some time, you will start finding your own ways to deal with things. Even after seven years, we sometimes have a problem understanding what the other person is going through. As you grow up, your life changes and you change with it. But when in a relationship you have to change according to your partner’s life too. If they are working the night shift, you’ll make more time during the day to talk to them.
Little things can make a big impact. Small gestures can increase your love and distance is not always so bad. It is never the deal-breaker.
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This post was previously published on Medium.
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