My boyfriend and I have been “a thing” for three and a half years now. It started off in the same city. We both lived in the same part of the North Island, in New Zealand; we met through his best friend (who I only recently started to get along with) and I was good friends with the guys he went to school with. It didn’t take long for our friendship to start, and it took even less for us to realise we both wanted something more.
A year later and we both finish college (high school). It’s that horrible time to choose what we’re going to do with the rest of our lives. He chose Engineering. In New Zealand, not every university offers engineering. The uni I chose doesn’t offer it. However, one down south does. So he moved. I didn’t get a say, he just left. We kept up the long distance for a year. Then s*** started to hit the fan. Distance isn’t easy and I wouldn’t wish it upon anyone. We broke up. And for two months we went our completely separate ways, I had a fling with my best friend, and my boyfriend started to move on too. My boyfriend came back for the holidays and for two weeks we tried to sort out everything that had gone wrong with us. We were still madly in love and it hurt more trying to move on.
Looking back on it, that should have been the breaking point; we probably should have left it there. We’ve both done things we regret since then; we’ve had huge periods where it’s just been too hard to even talk to each other and we’ve tried to move on. But something always brings us back together. Over the last few months we’ve had to work insanely hard at not getting angry at each other for living a different life, we have to accept that we’ve both changed, that we have different groups of friends now, want different things in life. Things are finally taking an upward turn. He finishes his degree next year and will be moving back home, when he’s here we’re gonna move in together and start living life like we never had the chance to.
Tomorrow I go down for his birthday to see him; it’s the worst possible time for me but I can’t break the promise that I’d go that I made a year ago. Cause in the end, even though everyone has an opinion and thinks they know better… Him and I – we’re meant to be doing this, we’re good for each other.
Distance is really, really, really hard. And I’m so lucky ‘cause I know I see him way more often that most people doing distance. So, to all those doing distance, sometimes you need to let go and give it a while before you try again. You never know, it might just make things a million times better.