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This blog is my personal take on the matter. While we all know it is really a challenge to keep a long-distance relationship (LDR) alive, some people manage to pull off a fine and satisfying love life. With humility, I can say I belong to this camp both in the past and in the present. I have three cases in point for your analysis and judgment, so let’s dig down into it right away.

This video gives an account on how love has possibly started.

My Sister’s Love Affair

The first case I want to talk about is my younger sister’s situation. She and her boyfriend have been in a romantic relationship for a relatively long time. If I’m not mistaken, their partnership has reached five or four years already. I don’t know for sure because I’m not the type who encroaches on someone else’s personal life and we don't talk too much about love life anyway. Still I’m wondering if their relationship would ultimately lead to marriage.

My sister has a boyfriend who lives in Manila, while we are in Mindanao. They have not met even once. Maybe they just saw each other on the web cam some time ago. Their main communication line is text messaging and calls. They talk regularly each day, and even many times per day, much to the inconvenience of everybody in the household. Anyway, we learned to live with it as days passed by.

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I have questions on my mind regarding their future life and whether they would have “forever” like what everyone else craves for. Do they really love each other that much that distance doesn't matter? How can you say you love someone if you haven't met him in person? Well, we can’t be so excited but we yearned to know the end of the story, if there is. I am hoping for a happy ending.

If you look at it more closely, Manila is not really so far away from Mindanao, especially now that airline promos are being offered every now and then, particularly with Cebu Pacific.

I wonder why the guy can’t pay her a visit even once in a while. Is he really serious about the relationship? The whole family wants to see his sincerity about their lot in the future.

My fear grew as I learned the frequency of their calls has significantly reduced, though they help each other out in terms of financial matters.

The guy was sending money to my sister monthly in the past, but it was cut short when his business suffered a debacle. Now that my sister has a fine work as a real estate agent, she occasionally helps her boyfriend out financially when needed.

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My Past Romance

The second case in point is my own story. I know you can already tell that our relationship didn’t pan out as I had hoped. But I can tell you up front that our parting was not a result of distance; it was a complicated case. The main issue was incompatibility and nonexistence of real love at the get-go.

When I and my ex were distantly separated from each other – take note our relationship was still intact at that time – that actually helped us get stronger. Before the LDR happened, I and my ex-girlfriend had problems in the past concerning our relationship. She broke up with me a lot of times. We've been in an on-and-off relationship. The relationship ground was even shaky when I went to General Santos City for work.

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When I was still there in Tagum City proximate to her, we used to see each other every day. She had someone to share her problems with and the thoughts bothering her. I was very supportive to her and I was always there when she needed me. In fact, I sent her to her work every morning and we frequently ate out at night.

Everything was okay until it turned gray. It came to a point when she could no longer relate to me. That may be because we always talked and saw each other, making our relationship dull and boring. There were times when she asked for a space in order to find her place under the sun and to figure out my place in her life.

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When I went to General Santos City for my day job, she started to miss me. There was even one night when she cried because she missed me so much and we we're not in good terms that time. She realized she loved me and her life was incomplete without me.

Our relationship was mended as a result of my absence. Distance helped us realize how we meant to each other.

Although we were miles apart from each other at that point, we thought our long-distance relationship would work.

I came to a conclusion that it is not healthy in a romantic relationship to always see each other. Each one also needs time to be alone.

As I mentioned earlier, our relationship ended eventually, but with a different reason. Her longing for belongingness and family love haunted her every day of her life.

She was still teaching her heart to love me and reciprocate my affection and kindness. But love was just not there in the very beginning, so we parted ways anyway at her continuous pleading, to which I conceded after some time. What I learned from that experience is that it is never a good idea to forge a relationship with someone when the feeling is not yet there.

This animation shows the negative aspects of love.

My Present Love

My present relationship is completely different from my previous one. I can’t almost believe how on earth we managed to keep the light burning even when it took a long while before we finally saw each other in person. Seven months passed by before the coveted first meeting. Anyway, true love is worth the wait after all.

I met my girlfriend on Facebook sometime on November 2014. We got hooked right away because both of us were lonely at that time. On March 30, 2014 we eventually became lovers, so we are celebrating our tenth monthsary at the time of this writing. Our relationship just gets stronger over time maybe because both of us are sure of each other.

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During our long-distance relationship, we had a few misunderstandings once in a while, but we went through all those successfully. Communication was hard because I barely had pennies to load my phone. Yet my girlfriend made the effort to keep the line open between us, especially when it matters the most.

My girlfriend almost gave up, thinking we would not be able to see each other after several months of waiting for me to pay her a visit, but she held on anyway. With the turn of events, probably with God’s divine intervention, suddenly I decided to finish my course on Mechanical Engineering in Mindanao State University, General Santos City. We finally saw each other after seven months of waiting.

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Now we see each other almost every day because we are both studying in the same school, although I rarely go to school because I stay at my boarding house while working on my designs. She even offers help to make my life a lot easier, which makes me a really lucky guy. What else could I ask at the moment? Luck comes when it’s least expected.

Since everything must come full circle, if you ask me whether long-distance relationship work, my answer is affirmative. It can work if both parties are determined to see it pan out. A line of communication must be in place to keep the fire burning, and it must not take a very long time before actual contact occurs, else what you have worked for might go down the drain.

This video shows the importance of loving and being loved in return.

Warning: This blog is my original work. Please don't plagiarize.