Dear Miss U,
My boyfriend and I have been acquaintances for about four years, close friends for a little over a year, in a committed relationship for nine months, and in an LDR for the past four months. He’s two hours away at college, and thankfully makes a point to drive home every few weekends to see me. In person our conversation is fantastic, we could go on and on for hours. The issue, is our communication when he’s away… When we text his reply time is lengthy to say the least. At times it almost ruins the whole conversation because hours later what we were talking about it irrelevant. I realize the both of us are very busy with school and we just sidetracked. I’ve tried telling him how important I feel communication is, especially in an LDR, but time and time again he apologizes and says he’ll try harder. Is there anything to do to help the situation? Or rather, how I can talk to him about fixing this issue?
– Linzee
Dear Linzee,
I think you might have missed the point of text messaging. It was developed so that you can leave a message that the person will see when they are free. It was never designed for real-time communication, nor for in-depth conversations. I think if you both agreed to use a more appropriate media for your conversations, during a time when you’re both available to give the contact most of your focus, you will have much better luck.
If you want to have an in-depth discussion about something and you prefer a textual medium, email is right up your alley. You could pour all your thoughts into that, edit it until it sounds exactly how you mean it, and then send it off. If however you want conversations in real time, you’re better suited to actually calling each other over the phone, Skype or Facetime.
Generally, if it’s complicated enough to require more than three texts in succession (per person) it’s probably important enough to wait until you can both focus on it in the time you set aside for your calls. So my recommendation is to text less, and put aside an extra 15 minutes or so for your end of the day phone call (or whatever routine you have) instead.
Dear Miss U,
My boyfriend and I live about 300 miles apart ever since we began attending separate universities in August. We normally try to visit once per month, but, this time, we waited a week or so longer because we knew we would have an extended break over Thanksgiving. Normally, when I see him, I get kinda emotional and feel a sense of completeness. I didn’t get that this time. I will admit, there were some circumstantial problems… my move hasn’t gone so well and our sleeping arrangements during this trip were kind of messed up. (We slept on the floor, enough to make anyone cranky.) My new job at the university has also left me pretty stressed out. I had a lot of fun with him this time, but it just wasn’t the blasty blast that it normally is. When you were in your LDR, did you ever have any off visits? How can I avoid letting stress ruin our visits in the future?
– Esmerelda
Dear Esmerelda,
I think these kind of visits are a good thing. Let me try and paint this in a positive light! When you’re living together, both working and/or studying, finances to juggle, maybe living in a less-than-ideal situation, throw in a kid or two, you’re going to have some really bad days. There’s going to be stress. There will most certainly be days you want to be happy but your body is too sore and tired to let you be. There will be times where your mind says “We should have sex” but your body says “Who could be bothered?” Other times you’re likely to irritate each other so much you wonder why you wanted this in the first place. But you’ll know that you can get through it, because you’ve gotten through lack-luster periods before. It helps you recognize the difference between what your relationship is like when you’re dealing with stress and what your relationship looks like when it’s in trouble – because you know right now there’s nothing actually wrong with how you feel about him and the relationship, you recognize outside factors are playing their part to make it challenging. Being able to identify that is important. Learning how to love and be happy in the face of challenges is also vital.
Yes, when Mr. E and I were long distance we did have one particularly bad visit. It was a long visit, and about a week before he arrived I lost my job and home. We too slept on the floor and it was nothing like he had ever experienced, as he comes from a much higher socio-economic class than I did. He’d never had to worry about where the next meal would come from, or who would let us borrow a square of floor before in his life. Instead of giving me the support I needed to help me through what I’d just lost, he was so overwhelmed it just added to my burdens. But it taught us a lot about each other, how to handle stress as a couple and work as a team. We talked about where each of us had handled the situation badly and put in place strategies to deal with similar events in the future. Like any couple, we’ve had our share of ruts and rocky patches, but that one terrible visit gave us the tools to get past some other things life tossed our way.
The best place to start so that stress doesn’t ruin your visits is by learning to better manage stress within yourself. Find an outlet so that you can let it go, especially switching off your work brain when you get home. An easy and effective way to do this is to have a shower and change out of your work clothes immediately upon returning home, and to not wear your work clothes casually if you don’t have a uniform. Keep the two world separate. Also, before work, be sure to prepare yourself a healthy snack that you can fall upon to revive you when you get back. It can be hard to come home and prepare something, but you’ll make better food choices if the easiest thing to eat is also the thing that will boost your mood and energy. Nuts, fruit, veggies that don’t require cooking, and canned fish can make a delicious snack that will pick your mood up and help you transition back into your everyday life. Yoga and meditation are likewise not just for new-agers and can be a great outlet to help you master how you feel throughout the day so all your experiences can be more positive ones.
Secondly, talk to him. Ask him how he felt, and share your experience. If there are ways he could have helped you manage your stress but didn’t, encourage him to act next time. Try and gain something from this that will serve your relationship.
Most importantly, learn to laugh bad things off and treat life as an exciting adventure. Attitude really is everything. It’s much easier to cope with sleeping on the floor (for example) if you approach it as though you’re choosing to go indoor camping rather than from the perspective that you’re doing something sucky that’s out of your control (even if the latter is the more truthful version!)
Best of luck with your next visit, I hope it makes up for this last one.
