Plans of closing distance flying away

[sunmat]

I guess this post is more of a way for me to write about what is bothering me right now as I have nobody to talk to.

Since the beginning of my relationship with my girlfriend, I've had the thought that our relationship had only 1% chances to succeed. By succeed I mean eventually closing the distance. We are both career-oriented and, in addition to that, she is pretty tied to her family. I thought it would be a miracle that we both end up finding a job that suits us in the same country/city, especially given that it would mean for her to live away from her parents, something she has never done before.

I won't go into details but these last few weeks, I felt like this 1% chance was happening: I have been interviewed for my dream job in France (note: I'm currently in the US, she is in Romania) and although I thought I wouldn't get it, I did got it. I'll start in December. This drastically reduces the distance between us, but it's not enough. In parallel, she considered applying for a PhD in a city one hour away from the city where I will be working. She even had 2 discussions with her potential future PhD advisor, and it turned out very well: he pretty much offered her the PhD position.

Then out of nowhere she freaked out. I just had a 1h skype talk with her where she was crying, saying she will cancel everything. Her reasons are irrational. The straw that broke the camels back was that her future potential PhD advisor asked her for something (sending him some comments about a research paper), making her feel that he was testing her and that he was unsure he wanted her for good. I get that she is under a lot of pressure: leaving her family, plus a bunch of work-related things stressing her a lot this week (I won't go into details). I couldn't say anything, she wouldn't let me. Conversation closed. She said she will send a mail next week to cancel everything.

It feels like a break up. She is blowing up the 1% chances we had to closing the distance, and I don't know if such a chance will happen again: I have secured my dream job and now all I can do is wait for her. I don't know how long. She is already doing a PhD in Romania that she would have given up to start the PhD in France, so if she finishes that one it's gonna be at least 2 years to wait, but with no guaranty that she will even try to find a job in my city after those 2 years.

I only see dead ends everywhere: I fear that during the next few months I end up considering that it is not worth waiting without guaranty, especially that when we had the chance to close the distance, she didn't take it.

[MissingMyDutchLove]

If she only has two years left, that means that she's pretty far along in her program, correct? That's a lot to ask of her to give that up to start all over again. I get that you're frustrated, but she needs to do what's best for her in the moment and if that is not giving up the 2+ years of work she's put into her PhD already, then you just have to support her and trust her that she will find a job in the city you are when the time is right.

[sunmat]

No, a PhD there is 3 years so she barely completed her 1st year. She is doing her PhD in parallel of her job, so she works on it at night. She cannot stop her job because the PhD scholarship is very small and not sufficient to live. She comes back home exhausted every day (it's hard for me to see her like that), sleeps less than 5h per night... The PhD in France would provide a full scholarship so no need for a side job, it's under the supervision of an outstanding advisor (I know him) who publishes in top conferences. In comparison her current PhD advisors don't even have funding to send her to good conferences, and they delegate extra tasks to her like supervising undergrads, without being paid for it. If she were to write an interesting paper during her current PhD, she wouldn't be able to present it in a good conference because her university won't pay for the travel. I know it's hard to give up one year and restart, but it's the right thing to do from every perspective: career, health, money... The tricky thing for her now is to go to her current PhD advisors and tell them she wants to quite, which I agree is difficult, and I think every single irrational detail becomes an excuse to shy away from this confrontation.

[ghanainlove]

Hello Sunmat, Congrats on the dream job, sorry about the closing complications.. Have you asked her what does she actually want to do? Cause closing the gap is a awesome milistone for a LDR couple, maybe shes just feeling the pressure, and as she calms down will be able to let you kno how she really feels.. Good luck and i hope things work out for yall

[differentcountries]

Moving countries to do a PHD sounds very hard. I can imagine especially if she is not used to living outside of her city/close to her parents, doing that for the first time while also doing the very difficult job of a PHD, that is very hard.

You seem very focused on closing the distance as soon as possible, but closing the distance while she is working on her PhD might turn out different than you imagined. I know people who did not finish their PhD (I am one of them, although I plan to do a doctoral later) or got divorced during.

Dont dispair because she is reconsidering moving to where you will be. When you move, you will stil be a whole lot closer than before, it will be cheaper and easier to travel and you can probably have visits easier. It worries me a bit that you call her second thoughts "irrational". It is VERY rational to not do something if you dont have a good feel about it. What you can do, is ask her to consider things from all sides, the good and bad, before she decides.

You have not even dated 6 months. No reason to go into panic mode because you cant close the distance right away. We have dated 3 years and are still not sure how to close the distance, and we are nowhere near breaking up.

[Mims27]

You should definitely ask her what she wants and what her goals are. If getting her PhD at home is what she wants to do, then you're gonna have to accept and support that. My SO chose to get her education before we closed the distance. We were LD for over 5 years. She didn't want to move to another country without experience or a degree that can help her get work here. I think that's reasonable. Now we are married and she lives in my country. Things may take a long time, but if they are meant to be, they will be.

[sunmat]

To answer all previous messages at once:

I'm not so much concerned about closing the distance than I am about knowing she CAN close the distance. As I said, we are both career-oriented, so if she gets cold feet when the perfect situation arises, then I'll never know if she won't get cold feet again at the next occasion. Career-wise also, a PhD in France is much more recognized than a PhD in Romania.

Regarding the fact that I call her second thoughts "irrational", I understand that we can have second thoughts but in that case the rational argument is "it's too much pressure for me right now". The arguments she gave me for not moving are irrational in the sense that she is looking for any detail (for instance just the way something was said by her future PhD advisor) to justify not moving.

Anyway, yesterday she sent me a message saying she overreacted because of the pressure and is coming back to her senses. Then a few hours later she panicked again but this time sent messages to her future potential PhD advisor instead of me, so that forced her to be more rational and he called her to clarify any doubts she could have. Right now she is back to her idea of moving. But all the obstacles is not yet overcome, so I hope she won't change her mind again...

[C.C.]

Well there you have it, now she has admitted that she is panicked and stressed.
I can't recognise myself or the dumb things I say whenever I enter panic and stress mode
Give her some space and trust her a bit. Don't pressure her, it won't change anything anyway, it's all up to her and she needs comfort more after all. Besides, decisions like that are scary, you are more rational and clear minded but it's not easy for her to be as well.

[neddrick98]

I second what C.C. says - it's hard to recognise we're in panic/stress mode until we're out of it or somebody tells us, so she is probably just anxious about changing basically every single aspect of her life. She's probably also nervous about meeting you and living together, in case it's not all it's cracked up to be. Be her rock and give her some peace and stability.