My partner and I have been having a lot of problems. We were together for 4 months and everything was absolutely perfect, everything was going right and we fit well with each other.
Then after the 4 months we were thrown into an unexpected long distance relationship which equals to a few thousand miles between us (17 hours plane journey). Our relationship changed a lot, its now been a year and one month since we started our relationship so 9 months has been long distance and this has been difficult to say the least.
I would say that I have become quite irrational, I am incredibly jealous now but I never was before the long distance. I trust him much less and I can stress a ridiculous amount which leads to getting angry with him for the smallest thing.
I kind of understand my jealousy because I am jealous of any girl that can be near him but I can’t be, that I have to be thousands of miles away and the horrible feeling that something could happen.
I have become a completely different person which he had always been patient about but I could never seem to change. I don’t know if I can ever change my jealousy especially in a long distance relationship, also the problem is that we would have to be in this distance for another few years.
Its been 9 months and the truth is I’ve been finding it absolute hell, I’ve been stressed, I’ve been crying almost everyday, and its horrible. My Partner on the other hand really likes a long distance relationship, hes been understanding because he loves me so much but I can’t seem to do that for him.
I don’t know at all what to do.
Lisa
————————————————–
Dear Lisa
Thank you for your email to me, I really feel for you, this is a horrible place to be.
You enter into a perfect relationship and just as it’s getting going, it’s now been taken away.
Now you are left will all these conflicts inside that are now making you really unhappy. On one hand you know these thoughts are irrational, but every day they’re coming into your mind uninvited.
There are two key areas here that are effecting you.
- 1. The man you love is thousands of miles away from you, and this is not how your relationship or life should be.
- 2. Your constant focus on potential problems has taken you to a place of fear, which has generated a version of you that is constantly worried and now becoming depressed.
When your life conditions don’t match how you think things should be, you can become miserable, depressed and in this place of fear you have unconsciously gone on a search to discover what problems this long distance relationship could create for you, for him, and the relationship.
- What’s happened is you have come up with loads of ways this relationship could hurt you or end.
Your boyfriend who seems to be trying to fix this relationship from thousands of miles away knows how unhappy you are, and is telling you that everything is OK and that a long distance relationship with him is not to be feared.
In fact you believe either through his words or your feelings that he likes the relationship this way. If you also believe that, then there is no end to living hell for you…
…I don’t believe any man that loves his woman wants to be thousands of miles away from her ( if you also share that thought, that could be making your feel worse, however…), I expect he is fearful of you getting so upset that you end the relationship, to escape your own fears, and so he could be playing his own feelings down to protect you.
Something needs to change, because you are making yourself unwell and these behaviours in you could create the thing you fear most and that’s a break up, because you both can‘t see away forward.
At the moment this situation for you equals the possibility of the end of your relationship every day.
The other part that I know is hurting you is that you want to give him love and yet from this place of fear you can’t, and that’s deeply hurting you too.
The bottom line is you feel out of control, not able to do, or be, what you want in a life situation you never saw as perfect for you or ever wanted or asked for.
For you to be happy again a change is needed, and so your focus and the meanings you are giving that focus has to be different for you to be OK.
Lisa I am going to contact you direct, I can tell you what needs to change, but I will have to work with you to make that change happen.
If Lisa is happy to work with me, we will be back to share the results.