Back in the early days of your relationship...

[Iodine]

Now, this thread is mainly for people who started their relationship with someone they had never met in person. But...

..Back in the early days of your relationship, what were some of the problems caused by the fact you were so far apart and how did they get resolved?

The reason I ask is that my SO's parents are very strict. They must have found out about me and grounded her to prevent contact. I realize that's just protection, but it's really getting to me. In just over 3 weeks, we've had a 5 minute MSN chat and a single email. It's just really difficult, y'know?

[FadedSunrise]

Well, I started my relationship CD, but I definitely deal with the strict parents issue. They found out about my SO through a letter he sent, and confronted me about it. We argued for days over it, and in the end they convinced me into breaking up for some time. But then in the end I came around behind their backs and got back together. Now I hide all communication. They know I have a lot of other friends I im with, so I only im him at home. I call him voice to voice from school after class, or in parking lots.

[LadyEcstsasy]

My SO and I met in college, but didn't get together for three years and by that point he was back in school and I was taking a break from it. I too have the strict parental problem. My parents are somewhat fine with it (though they make it clear they don't support me jetting off to see him), his parents are adament most of the time about keeping me away from him. For us it's about them calling me a distraction because he's in college and needs to focus on his studies. And I can understand they're having troubles adjusting to the situation because I am his first girlfriend.

Our situation isn't that strict, since he lives at college he talks to me all the time and his parents can't stop him. But when he's home with them things are awkward and he has to run skype with headphones in so they don't hear what I'm saying and sometimes we just end up typing rather than talking. The main thing they do is try to prevent him from seeing me and make threats about what will happen if I do visit him. Too bad he's dating the rebellious type I'm sneaking up to visit him tomorrow.

I'm not suggesting being a rebel, each situation is unique so you'll have to weigh the pros and cons of it all. But maybe you should resort to snail mail, or your SO can go to a library to email you more often. Have your SO figure out exactly what their problem is (example: for us it's because of grades) and be on your best behavior to put their fears to rest. Good luck.

[MrsExPrez]

Okay, well I will be the first person to comment starting long distance.
We have been dating for 7 and a half months and it still will never be resolved until we are physically together. I think everyone on this website, regardless of their situation, can vouch that it can cause crabiness, disagreements, etc.

Hmm.. the only problems I can think of though in the very beginning that sort of relate to you was him and I deciding what we wanted to do with our feelings for each other and that sort of thing. Deciding if it was worth it to form a relationship under the circumstances we are in. A long distance relationship is a GIANT commitment. There is no getting around that. You have to be strong and independent and trust in your partner. You also have to know how to compromise. That is a huge part of a LDR. Things won't always be simple.

As far as your particular problem goes, if she is under 18 which I suspect she is because she was grounded, then you kind of have to respect her parents' wishes. Ride it out. She won't be grounded forever. Are you positive that is the reason she isn't contacting you? You said "you think it is". Is there any chance it has to do with something else?

And if that IS the case, well maybe she needs to try to be open and honest about you to her parents. I have no clue what their relationship is like obviously, but if her parents won't allow it.. then.. I don't really know what else you can do.

[NaNi]

Well, my SO and I started out LD since we met over the internet. It was really hard at first because her mom was not really happy with what was going on between us. There were lots of fights and tears, so we decided to meet after 4 or 5 months of communication.

Everything was so much better after my visit. Maybe because her mom could meet me, see me. It made her realize that our relationship was just not an internet romance, but that we actually wanted to be together.

[Far_Away_So_Close]

Oh, don't tell me about it. My mum found out when she found his shirt in my suitcase. She hasn't actively done anything that would physically prevent us from keeping contact, but she gave me hell. She would go into the room when we were on Skype without notice, completely ignoring the fact that I'm in the middle of a conversation, and start talking to, or sometimes yelling at, me. When I confornted her about the fact that she would never do it when I was on the phone with my ex (which was CD and whom she was quite fond of before our messy breakup), she stated that I should cut the realtionship. Every now and then she would suggest that I should be dating. If I came home late from a party, she would ask me about guys, knowing full well that cheating is the farthest thing from my nature - as if he didn't even exist. At some point she went as far as offering to fix me up with some guy from her work.
I have avoided mentioning my SO's name or his existance at all cost - which was painful, because so many things reminded me of him, and I wanted to share. I started timing our Skype talks for when she was away.
All this went away after he came to visit me and she got to meet him. She is now rooting for us, and can't for him to provide her with grandchildren.

[Iodine]

As far as your particular problem goes, if she is under 18 which I suspect she is because she was grounded, then you kind of have to respect her parents' wishes. Ride it out. She won't be grounded forever. Are you positive that is the reason she isn't contacting you? You said "you think it is". Is there any chance it has to do with something else?

I'm 18, she's 17, so it won't be long before she's free; thank goodness.

Yeah I am sure it's grounding. That's pretty much all that's been said in the email and the small chat. I'm really proud of her for getting that information to me though as I was worrying that the worst had happened. It's hard for me to not think the worst sometimes. She's told me to trust her and I can manage that.

Thanks for all the responses so far. It's helpful to know others have been through the same thing and to hear it from the other side.

[Beastofknowledge]

Well my mother still hates him, despite the fact we have been together nearly 11 months, a year, all for no reason.
She was initially ok about me being in a LDR until she met him, and then all went down hill.
Its ok for the time being, she doesn't say much anymore because she knows I'm not backing down out of the LDR for her sake.
He's 20 this year and I've just turned 18, so as soon as we are in University, then we will be free of her negative comments to be honest.

[Alisz]

When I was younger and in my first LDR relationship, my family freaked out when my ex came to visit. They were just trying to protect me and didn't really understand that not everyone online is a rapist... -_-;; When I wanted to visit my ex for the first time some were hesitant, but allowed it while others didn't want me to go... I was 18, so they couldn't really stop me. I did get in a huge argument with my father and I felt very bad for going against him. BUT they eventually warmed up to the idea. I guess they realized I was going to do what I wanted to regardless and that my ex wasn't an axe murderer heh.

I still have problems telling them things about my current relationship because of that incident. I've told family members about Ray, but they seemed uninterested so I didn't push it. :/ It's never been a problem for Ray as he understands. It used to bug me more in the beginning of our relationship, but I've come to accept now that the only way for them to "get it" is to meet him in person, so we'll just wait. But because of this he'll have to come visit first and get a hotel room for him. The hotel was his idea. He didn't want to impose staying with me just in case. I'm pretty sure once they meet him and see what I see they'll be fine, but they just can't get past the computer screen. :/ His family on the other hand are more understanding. Well, his immediate family. Extended are like my family, so he understands in that respect too.

[Silviar]

My SO and I started online. Oh, we had/have loads of things:

1) 13-15 hours time difference, depending on daylight savings time. We still have problems with this. All you can do is be patient and understanding.
2) When he first told his mom about me, she was really concerned I might be a scammer/one of those people who gets someone to buy them a vacation somewhere and then disappears afterwards. Add on top of that that I was still married at the time (separated, but lived in the same house), and it's no wonder that she had some concern.

This isn't so different from your situation. What I think needs to happen eventually is she needs to be honest about there's someone that she likes, but that you met over the internet and you're both taking it slow and not making any wild plans. It also usually helps if you can have a Skype chat - you and she can sit down with her mom/dad and you can say hello to them. That's how I helped my SO's mom get to know me, because it was extremely important to us both that we get our family's to be ok with our partner choice, as we're both family-oriented people. At the end of it she was really glad to get to know me, and she said she could see why Matt loved me so. She even invited me to come stay at their house for my trip out there to meet him, if I wanted.

[13000km]

One of our biggest problems was my non-commitance (is that a word?) but that slowly started being less of a barrier through his encouragement and his showing how much he cares and how important I am to him. It was when we met that that issue was finally completely resolved. I got to meet his family and loved being around them. (:

There have also been a lot of insecurity and jealousy on my end which (with a lot of reassuring words) has mostly faded.

As for my family and friends, they know about him but not about our relationship. I mean, they probably can guess without me telling them, but I haven't actually told anyone he's my boyfriend now. When I first told them I was flying out to see him there were a lot of o.O reactions and people discouraging me from going, but after the trip, and after they got to talk to him via skype, my family and close friends have become friends with him too.

[xopookie]

Back in the early days, I was just excited to just be in a relationship (Too many rejections from men in HS and being jaded from all those "How to get a Man" books) . So I was just very driven, but I ended meeting my SO. The problems was was that I didn't realize how hard long distance relationships are and that it was shocking because I didn't get to see my honey all the time. At first, I got to see my honey all the time because we were in that honeymoon stage and plus I would complain about the lack of physical attention. Oh I forgot, yeah my SO also wasn't too sure about doing a LDR because he did a LDR with his gf from HS and she ended up cheating on him. So he was very weary about doing long distance and wanted to make sure that I was the girl for him to do that. Ok now I remember :P. But now I don't get to see him as often, as I did before because well we've accepted the fact that we're in a LDR and we're there till the end.