We had the closing the distance talk. How did yours go?

[Jelly11]

When I brought it up I didn't expect it to turn into a two hour long chat about our future, but I suppose at some point it needed to be done. I just casually asked him if he ever thought about us and how we could close the gap.

I'm wondering how your close the distance talks have gone, if you've had them?

I'm unsure how to feel about ours, as whilst I like how he clearly had been thinking about it, I didn't expect for it to take as long as he thinks it will. It's also clear that his career comes before anything else. He basically said once he's at the stage he Wants to be in his career then we can close the distance. He estimates three years. To be honest I don't know if I can do this for that long. At least not without significant changes to how we see each other (ie, spend longer periods of time together).

[Honour]

Our hands are tied in our relationship. He works night shifts in a prison as a CO, with no way of getting time off until he puts in dates at the end of the year. Max time he could get off this year, for example, was 11 days, which we would have spent together because we would have met for the first time if fate hadn't intervened. I'm at uni studying for a degree, with less than a year before I graduate (hopefully) but my health issues mean regular employment is going to be tricky. We've talked several times about closing the distance, but we have no concrete plans yet, and it'll probably be a few years more before we can be together. He copes with the distance much better than I do, most days I can barely deal with it. We've talked about a future together, marriage, children, deal breakers for me because I don't want to end up fighting for something that in the long run won't work out for us because of differences in beliefs, etc.

TL;DR Things aren't perfect, far from it, but I can't imagine a world without him in it. I don't want to. I've grown up a lot in some respects as we've been together, and learned a lot about myself, not to mention him. It's why everytime I feel down and feel like I can't cope, I remind myself there's someone out there who really cares for me, and is willing to fight for me. So I will fight too.

[R&R]

We had the conversation pretty early in. There was no question as to if it was going to happen, but when. In most LDR's, the end result is to finally be together.

We're also in our 40's, so the situation in some aspects may be really different than those in our 20's. We don't have to have the kids discussion and we're both established in our careers. We've been together close to 3 years and though we were going to try to close the distance this fall, it looks like it will now be next year. (If I can get a job where I can work remotely, it will be sooner.) We haven't seen each other in over a year now. Yes, kind of a long time but one day we'll be together all the time and it will be worth the wait.

[C.C.]

I don't know if it can be called a closing distance talk because I don't think it has been detailed enough. But either way, we've talked about it.
As to where we'd like to live, hopefully in Finland, or somewhere else in Europe. Some third country.
As to when, 5-6 years would be a bliss. This part doesn't even need much discussing, it's on me. I am young, I need to finish my studies, etc. And it'd take that long for him as well, I think. I mean we want to be two independent adults with enough settlement in life. So it's realistic approach for it to take at least that much in our case.
I think career being more important is not really a bad thing. Closing distance and all is fun but for some people, it's important for them to be settled in life before big decisions. It's hard to wait, yes. But I think it's more worth it in the end. Personal opinions, though.
Your relationship is rather new as well, right? Take this online communication time to learn more about him and to advance your relationship on deeper levels so that you won't have to deal with more troubles when you are finally together. LDR helps as pace the relationship in our speed while dealing with our individual lives at the same time. It's hard but it has its pros and opportunities.

[Katy_G]

In our case it was more of talks. The basic question was 'when will you be home for good?' A lot of it depended on his job situation, if he would choose to extend his overseas contract or even seek work elsewhere. My moving overseas was (and still is) definitely not an option.

Long story short it took a lot of discussion and periodically evaluating and reevaluating if it was time to close the distance. Eventually my SO decided for himself that he was done with his job, and that he had saved up enough for his plans here at home. And that's now how we are here, one week into closing the distance.

[sasad]

Well... he came for a week visit that lasted a month. He went out and bought clothes and stuff to put in my closet. Now we think of Florida beach house as our vaca home and VA house where we live. Have NOT closed the distance yet, but we have long visits up in VA. Next year for sure. We are both older, have the kids stuff done and are set in careers.

[aoitori]

I wanted to move even before we started dating, but now I want it even more of course. When he asked me to be his girlfriend, he asked with the aspect in mind, that we'd eventually be together for good. So we were pretty much talking about from the very first day. I'm graduating right now and now I need to find a job. I've come to dislike the topic a bit, not because I don't want to be together, but rather because all the pressure is on me. I love talking about our future together and making plans, but the little "what if I can't find a job" is hanging over the happy talk like a dark shadow. Hope we can close the distance within this year.

[differentcountries]

We did not really have any close the distance talk until we had dated a full year. It went something like this (at at restaurant in Turkey):
Him: it is not for nothing that people want to go to your country. Workers have rights
Me: That is true. Those are limited in Turkey, I understand
Him: Would you consider living in Turkey?
Me: I love your country, you know this. But I am not allowed to work here unless I have a skilled job AND I know Turkish, at least medium level. I can't really use my English much.
Him: That's true
Me: It is nice that you want to consider my country. But even if you have seen pics and heard storires, you have not visited. Let's have a first visit, and take it from there.
He had his first visit four months later, loved it, hated it, visited friends here. I have studied Turkish up to like advanced beginner's level. He has learned some Norwegian but not much (but he did finish his education). We are starting on the preperations for his second visa which will be our longest visit so far (2 months). The idea is for him to learn Norwegian and to have a go (at least for a weekend) at this restaurant that we know. Then possably later get a work visa to try out working there half a year. And then go from there. Since then, the political situation in Turkey has changed for the worse and we are not considering at all to live there permanently.

[xxcazaxx]

We speak about it quite often. To start with he wanted to wait till we were face to face to chat about it. We have spoken about our plans for the future - where to live, marriage, kids, careers (he is currently changing his). The only uncertainty relates to visas. Have a feeling that this could be a sticking point in the future. But where there is a will there is a way so they say.

[ThePhoenixRises]

We had the discussion during the first visit (he came to me). The discussion went really well and we both want the distance closed. It would be me moving to him, as he has a young child. However, we both thought that it would be intelligent if I were to visit his country (I had never been before) to see what I thought of it, and if I thought that I could see myself living there. I have now visited his country for 5 weeks, and I really can see myself living there. We have now had the discussion more seriously. But I have a lot of things I have to organise before I can move, not to mention figuring out the visa etc and seeing how we will do this. He already has a place for us to live, so that is no issue, and I have started leaving some of my things there now, which is a nice feeling.

But I really wanted to wait until we had at least visited each other's countries once before we even had the serious talk. I already have two more visits to his country planned in the next 5 months (one will be a longer visit also - so that I can really get a feel for how it is to live with him and be in his country). He will also be coming back to visit me soon.

He has met my family and I have met some of his family. I also wanted to make sure that his daughter was somewhat accepting of me before we made firm plans. I have now met her, and so far it has gone really well - better than I ever could have imagined (she is quite young however so I know that this can change). She knows that when I am staying there, that I will be sharing a bed with him, and so far she has accepted it.

[xsilhouette]

We didnt have a talk. The second time i visited returning with him from my country i remember one day when i was getting ready he said to me something along the words of do you know something? And then he told me that i should know that after all this being in love so much, being so connected and so close we wont be able to stay far from each other for long. And i knew it he was right. Later on we started working towards that obstacle of being apart being removed.

So a year or so later after that talk, that talk above was like 8 months into our relationship, we touched the wedding subject. One night when we walked out he mentioned it when i was making fun and i remember that night we both admitted its what we want but we didn't want to do it like to seem we are doing it just to be together, to cpose the distance. But later we talked it again and well, at last we decided. There wasnt many stuff to do too, because otherwise we would have that 3 month gap to see each other again, so we agreed right there that our next step will be marriage. We said hell, we would marry either way, so speeding it a bit up wont hurt if it means being together every day. And thats what it happened. And looking back today its the best decision we ever made. We are happy together. Have a cat together. Live together .

So i couldnt have asked for a more happier outcome

So if i would be to say when to have a clising the distance talk i wouldnt have exact timeline. I would say you'll feel it when its enough of the distance. You wont want to stay apart even a day more , so thats a good time to make a plan to close it

[kittyxuchiha11]

we've talked about it a few times and every time it just sort of ends up with her going nope i don't want to move to your house there's too many big spiders haha. But seriously we're still trying to figure out how we want to close the distance and just now it looks like i'm going to be moving over there after i've finished my education. although she could just move over here if she really wants although immigration laws don't make that too easy. it's all very up in the air so we basically just say we'll be together in 2 or 3 more years somwhere

[littlewingxx]

We talked about closing the distance towards the end of my first visit. I was with him for three months almost, so we had a pretty good idea of how we were together day to day. We'd been friends online for a few years prior to any romantic relationship developing, so I feel like we had a good understanding of each other and our hopes, desires etc.

Him coming to me has never been an option really, as he has a young son who he does a lot for and I'd never expect him to make that move in any case having a young child. I on the other hand, have no ties and nothing over here that would make it particularly difficult to move overseas. So it's always been a given that it'd be me moving to him, which I'm happy with.

I just got back today from a month long visit to him and in the next few weeks we'll be filing our K1 paperwork . Having a concrete plan to close the distance and actually actively working on it has made such a huge difference to how we both feel having parted again this time. We both feel sad to be apart again obviously, and we're missing each other like crazy, but we both feel so excited and focused now that things are underway. Instead of that gnawing heart ache we both felt after our last two visits were over, we're both feeling calmer, determined and so happy we're finally making this happen. I still can't quite believe it...feel like I need to pinch myself!

[staruletto]

We've been talking about getting married since pretty early on.... I'd say 5 or 6 months in maybe? Mostly joking if course. Ironically we started dating in the first place because we were "mostly joking". Now after meeting we're actually serious about getting married. I guess I'm unofficially engaged? I'm not calling it official until he meets my family and friends of course. He needs their approval too.