Are long distance relationships always destined to fail? My story.

A question many of us have probably been thinking: does it ever really work? I'm guessing most read the header and think "hell no". A quick look at a few online discussions leads to the same answer. However, I'm sure some of you are thinking "yeah, why couldn't it work?". So did I three years ago.

My long distance relationship story is not the usual "we met online but were from the opposite sides of the globe" one, although I met my girl online. I was lucky, she only lived like 30 minutes away from where I live. We slowly got to know each other, started to get a slight crush on her, the feelings were mutual etc. The usual stuff. We still weren't dating though, not officially. Then one day, she got an acceptance letter from a university in Sweden. We're from Finland so the distance is not that big but the university is way up north in a city that is quite hard to reach so traveling there from where I live takes some time.

So there I was, having a massive crush on a girl who was leaving for sweden for 3 years. At this point, any reasonable or even remotely sane person would have called it quits. Hell, even the girl was hesitant about starting a relationship in a situation like that. When I think of the situation afterwards I can't really understand what the hell I was thinking back then. Instead of thinking "okay that's just dumb, don't start anything" I thought "Full steam ahead, three years is nothing!".

The summer before she left was kinda weird. We ended up dating and it got pretty serious, we spent a lot of time together and we both completely forgot what was coming, until like a week before she was supposed to leave. When we met for the last time and it was time to go, she cried. It didn't feel that big then, but now that I know her better I understand that it must have been super tough for her. She almost never cries.

Fast forward 2,5 years and here I am, still together with my girl. We've had our tough times in our relationship, but we have never felt like giving up on each other. At first I had these moments maybe once a day when I called myself stupid for getting into something as suicidal as a long distance relationship. As the time passed, I started getting them less and less and nowadays I don't really feel that way anymore. We've found our ways to show affection and keep each other happy: we use whatsapp, have long phone calls, send letters every once in a while etc. Do you remember how good it feels to receive a letter? Now multiply it by 10 and you get the idea how it feels getting one in a situation like this. I also visit her a few times a year and she comes here every now and then.

So the answer to the question in the header: no, they don't fail every time. I now understand why they fail most of the time, I really do. Nothing I've ever done has taken this much will power and effort. That said, I couldn't be happier that I had the moment of complete madness back then. I have never had a relationship that is more solid than this and now that my girl is returning soon, I can confidently say we made it.

As crazy as it sounds, I wouldn't change a thing. This period of time has forced me to grow a lot. It has also enforced our relationship to the point where I feel like we can survive pretty much anything together.

If you read this far then I'd like to thank you for taking the time to do so. Hopefully this can give hope to someone who is struggling with similar issues. If you have any questions you'd like to ask, I'm happy to answer. Peace.

-R