I am going to talk about the main obstacles we had to face in the first year we knew each other.
When you think of long-distance relationships, I’m sure you think of the distance being the most frustrating inconvenience. Well, not the case with us.
What are you supposed to do when you are between a rock and a hard place? I still don’t know how to answer that, even though I went through it.
One of our biggest obstacles at the time was also one of the most obvious to us, I was already in a relationship. Yes, you read that right. I was already in a sort-of committed relationship with my now ex-boyfriend. Now, before you all start calling me names for giving someone false hope while being with someone else, you are right, I was a total bitch. 🤣 Looking back at how I dealt with things then, it’s clear I could’ve handled matters in a better way.
Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. I was in a two-year relationship with a then classmate of mine. For the sake of keeping his identity a secret, I’ll call him Charlie. Before meeting my husband online, Charlie and I started having issues with our relationship. I’ll be frank, it was a lack of communication on both parties, at least in my perspective. Yes, we were classmates, we saw each other every day for classes, we would hang out every other weekend, the usual. However, that was pretty much it. We stopped going on dates, we wouldn’t talk on the phone anymore, we just weren’t as engaged in each other as we used to be, but I couldn’t call it quits. I knew Charlie was still in love with me, and I was afraid to hurt him. He was my very first boyfriend, so I had no prior break up experiences, and what made it more difficult is that I cared for him enough to not want to hurt his feelings, but I still didn’t want to continue having a relationship with him. So, we continued our relationship for five more months… bad idea. While I was developing feelings for Sheldon, my now-husband, I was still with Charlie. It was a very messy situation for everyone involved.
More on that some other time.
The other obstacle, I guess, would be telling my parents. I was the one who wanted to hide the relationship from them, mostly because I didn’t know how they would react. I was seventeen when we met online, still a junior in high school. I thought my parents would not approve because I didn’t know their opinions on long-distance relationships. So we kept it hush for two years. That’s not to say there weren’t slip-ups. Oh no.
On one occasion my dad found my tablet with the chat window open, and he saw a big “I love you” in there. He questioned me all confused. Who was Sheldon and why am I telling him I love him? Very legitimate questions and I had to come up with answers fast. I rapidly said that he was a friend that happens to be American, and they throw around I love you’s as often as they say hi and goodbye. Phew, he bought it and I dodged a bullet, for now.
I have more examples, but it’s hard to remember everything, especially when you want to. It’s easy to laugh about the stuff that has happened during that time, regardless of the incertitudes.
For my next post, I will go more in-depth about certain situations I had to deal with. Thanks for visiting my blog and reading about my messy stories.
Love at a Distance 