Falling in love at a distance

[jmay292]

I'm seriously starting to fall in love with my boyfriend, and I am so scared. For one thing, I've never been in love before. Don't get me wrong, I'm no stranger to relationships, but that has been the major issue of my relationship history, I've never wanted to fall in love, the idea of being submissive to another person, to have someone know me more than I know myself, to be close enough to me to hurt me, always scared me. The idea of monogomy was scary to me. But I secretly always wanted someone who would change that all for me. And now he's here and I'm scared. And actually, he really isn't here. He's 3600 miles away living a life completely opposite of what I know. But every single day, every time we talk, things are just easier and easier between us. There's more love, more understanding, more laughs, more bullshitting, more everything.

But am I just setting myself up for heartbreak? I'm scared to love. And especially scared to love someone who's so far away...

[alesitag]

I'm new to LDRs, but one thing I know... I feel happier than I ever did in any of my two previous CDRs... there's a whole country between me and my baby, and still I fell in love with him completely. He makes me feel like I've never felt before. Listening to his voice gives me goosebumps. Thinking about him makes me smile... and yes, it sucks not having him around, and I know he feels the same way because he's always telling me how much he wants me to be over there...

Of course it scares me sometimes, we haven't met each other IRL. I've been having very distressing dreams about him, the first one was about he calling me to say a friend of his which used to be his friend with benefits, asked him to move in with her... then, I dreamed of the first time we meet and a totally different person showed up saying it was him... then, I dreamed about him trying to sell me in pieces (it might sound funny, but these dreams were disturbing enough to make me wake up and unable to go back to sleep)...

I remember we were talking about feelings and relationships and things like that before we got "together while apart", and he said he had always been very careful regarding relationships and being involved with just any girl, and I told him "the day you meet the right one, you'll let it flow and jump into love without any question"... he replied he knew that, even if the girl happened to be already in a relationship (I was at the time, but I had no Idea he was talking about me)... shortly after that he confessed having feelings for me, and I started developing feelings for him too... long story short, I ended up breaking up with the guy I had been dating for 5 years for my own personal reasons, and now here we are... Ale and Pat, loving each other from a distance.

Don't be afraid to love, if you know what you want and he happens to be it, go for it!! Give happiness a shot , after all, who said you have to see or touch somebody every day to love him? Love knows no distance!

[Zapookie]

I was scared too... but you know the way I thought of it was - hey, if I let myself love him, and allow him to love me too, we have the potential to be something amazing. And if things don't work out, well then I'll just chalk it down to life experience.

I had nothing to lose, but the entire world to gain. I don't regret my decision at all. It's been amazing. The only thing I do regret is not allowing myself to love him sooner.

[LoveJ]

Some of the best things in life come when you open yourself to things that scare you. And keep in mind that the idea of what could go wrong is always scarier than what actually could.
Meeting and falling in love with my fiance was scary for both of us, even though we knew really early on that it was going to be "it" for us. Circumstances weren't perfect, and that was terrifying at times, but we just rested in each other and plowed forward. And it turned into everything I've ever wanted.
My point is, even if it's scary, if you have any inkling that this guy could be something big for you, go for it. When you love someone, love them completely; you'll get back a lot more than you realized was possible. <3

[CanadianGirl]

"the idea of being submissive to another person, to have someone know me more than I know myself", you know, I don't feel these things are true. Love isn't about submission, but more about acceptance and respect. No one can possibly know you better than you can know yourself, but they can help you find a deeper self-understanding.

It is pretty scary though. This is my first relationship and within the first few months, when I started realizing that it was real love, I tried to hold myself back. I tried to keep parts of myself hidden in this weird attempt to avoid complete rejection if things didn't work out. It's worth the risk and you'll never find that connection unless you try. Even if things don't work out down the line, at least you won't have to live with the regret.

[Kristin91]

For me, falling in love with my SO I had no control over... I just realized that I was in love with him one day. But I know for a fact that I would have rather tried (even though I was also terrified of falling in love with him because I had previously been in a really bad relationship) and given the relationship everything I had, than not try at all. At least this way, if it doesn't work out I know I did everything in my power to try to make it work. And if it does work, then I've gained the best friend I could ever want or need

[lyonsgirl]

"the idea of being submissive to another person, to have someone know me more than I know myself", you know, I don't feel these things are true. Love isn't about submission, but more about acceptance and respect. No one can possibly know you better than you can know yourself, but they can help you find a deeper self-understanding.

I understand your point, CanadianGirl, but in a sense love IS about submission. Loving someone means you'll give up things for them. Let me give you a made-up example. There's a couple who were college sweethearts and got married after they graduated. Let's call them Bob & Linda. Bob would go mountain biking with his buddies nearly every weekend all through college. He didn't give that up throughout his marriage-he was determined to continue biking. Linda started to feel resentment towards Bob because she didn't feel like he was spending enough time with her, and the house needed repairs. She had a very large "to-do" list for him, and he just kept saying, "I'll get it done." A year went by, and the gutters still weren't cleaned. (Bob & Linda couldn't afford to pay someone to do it for them.)

To make Linda - and their marriage- happier, Bob realized that he needed to cut back his mountain biking. For them. So he didn't go, and got started on his list. Linda was happy, and Bob was happy because they stopped fighting about the list.

So, yes. To an extent, love is about submission. It is not "let my SO do whatever they want because I love them". If you want to think of it differently, love is about sacrifice. Love is about compromise.

I agree with you though-no one can possibly know you better than you know you. Although, it gets a little freaky when your SO can start to read your emotions, even through phone calls.

[CanadianGirl]

I feel compromise and sacrifice are very different from submission. Submission is one-way, so perhaps the OP meant a mutual submission or humbling, which is obviously necessary to keep a relationship healthy.

[jmay292]

Perhaps submission wasn't the right choice of word, but I'm seeing it in kind of a different way I think. In all of my past relationships (which have all been CD), I was always a pretty aggressive, feeling the need to assert my dominance, in a way. I always wanted to make sure that the other person knew, I'M the one with the power here, and if anyone is going to cause any emotional harm, it's going to be ME. I've always had that wall, I've never wanted to let anyone in, and it always made me feel good and powerful knowing that nobody could hurt me because I wouldn't let them. I would not allow someone to get close enough to know the things about me that would really cause me harm. To me, that's submission.

But with him...it's so different. He absolutely makes me melt. I remember one of the few days that we actually spent together when I was in Costa Rica, I was staying the night with him and I would up at some point having a panic attack, so I moved him arms off of me, got up and when to the bathroom to try and calm down. When I went back to bed I was still shaking, curled up in a ball in the corner because I didn't want him to touch me. He could feel my shaking so he woke up and said, "Estas bien, baby?" "Si, solo tengo frio (i'm cold)" He cuddled up behind me and tried to put his arms around me, but I tried to wiggled out of it. So he wrapped his arms around me even more and pulled me into his body. I remember he was so warm, so comfortable, the second the pulled me close against my will, I melted. I stopped shaking, I stopped panicking, and I gave in. And it felt good.

That's what he does to me. He makes me melt, he listens to me when I talk and encourages me to say more. He makes me comfortable. Comfortable enough to cry in front of him, which I do for nobody. He makes me drop my guard, lower that wall. He makes my voice go from strong, independent woman who holds the power, to a little whimpering puppy who just wants to be held and kissed and loved. Which feels great, but also fucking terrifying. He's so far, I have know idea what he's doing. We've had good conversations about that, I know he loves me and he says we're on the same page, but I just feel so vulnerable.

I still have so many destructive relationship habits that I'm trying to break, but it's hard, especially at such a distance. I still find myself, almost every day, trying to find the negative in our relationship. I try to scare myself, tell myself all the things that could go wrong when I see him, of all the reasons why we SHOULDN'T be together. And then I talk to him, and he makes me melt into a big pile of mush again...

---------- Post added at 10:26 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:24 AM ----------

wall=way
would up=woke up

[MeganK]

I was scared at first, It didnt take me long to realise how much i cared for him and how much i wanted him to be mine.
He realised the same thing, he even told me he tried to fight the feelings but he couldnt any longer.
Ive never ever ever ever ever regreted going into this LDR, ive never been happier with anyone in this world then him.
Hes changed my life in so many ways, ill never be able to thank him enough.
Ill be so happy to finally be his wife one day soon.

Dont be afriad of love, Be adventurous. Lose urself in him. Dont let being scared get in ur way of falling for him, falling for him
might be the best thing to ever happen to u.

It sure was for me. Im thankful every single day that hes in my life.