So carrying on from the question - do long distance relationships work or are they too much work? You be the judge .  .  .

It was exactly 8 years ago that I took a trip to Morocco that changed my life. Most common question I get asked besides ‘what do I do?’ would be ‘how did you two meet?’. Many have heard the derailed fairy tale response to the latter, but for new listeners, here is the story of how I went bi-continent.

I was dating someone at the time when a close male friend asked me to jump on board the adventure train for spring break and ditch Florida for an exotic escape to Morocco?!? I had the time off from work, so I figured what the hell? Count me in. Joining us in Morocco would be my mates friend who he met tenting in Africa a year prior (presently living in the UK). I took little notice upon first meeting him as I was not traveling to meet someone nor looking.

We all know the saying, when you least expect it .  .  . this was that moment. As the week went on, we talked non-stop for hours aboard transport between cities. I became quite fond of this kiwi-bloke, but nonetheless, nothing happened and I headed home to the US at the end of the week to my boyfriend of 2 years. I won’t lie, when I say nothing happened, I mean nothing physical happened, but emotionally I had changed forever. I honestly left thinking I had met the person I was supposed to marry. Crazy yes. For those who know me, no;-)

I will spare you my attempts to stay grounded and continue on with my relationship as if Morocco had been but a dream, yet it wasn’t. I will also spare you the drama and whirlwind of hurt feelings that followed. At the end of the day, no matter how difficult, if the relationship is not right for you, the best thing you can do is let that person go. In the months that followed I did. I became my own best company and single girl out on the town living it up with my girlfriends. In the months that followed I eventually reconnected with the kiwi-bloke in the UK on email and by phone. We were more or less pen pals.

He is quite a practical person. Logistically I was out of reach, if the thought even crossed his mind! Although he later made this point very clear when I went to visit London with my girlfriend and he came down from Yorkshire. This would be the ‘derailed’ part of the story - something out of a scene from a movie. I returned home emotionless and confused, continuing to just live care-free as singletons do.

So how was it then that we did ended up on the same continent? I guess you could say that the defining moment was his decision a few months after the London debacle to fly via the states en route to New Zealand and back again instead of through Asia. It was in Chicago that he asked me to spend the summer with him in Edinburgh and ‘give it a go’. I did and 3 months later returned back to work. A couple of months later he moved to Cleveland, Ohio, USA for one wild and cold winter season, then moved back to NZ. A couple of months later I joined him in Wellington, NZ for the summer/his winter once work finished. It was close to the end of that trip he proposed to me bungee-jumping tandem in Queenstown, NZ. A wedding with friends and family in Vegas (sorry not by Elvis) and here I am, going on 5.5 years living on the other side of the world far from what I still call ‘home’ aka: Cleveland.

It has definitely been one emotional roller-coaster. I have been fortunate enough to make some great friends in NZ and confine in other ex-pats who moved to be with their best friend/love of their life. I would be lying if I said there were not times that I wanted to jump ship throughout the ‘courting’ period and that living so far from others you love is easy. Yet, if I had to do ‘long distance’ all over again, I would.

Side Note: If you don’t trust one another it will never work no matter how far or close the distance in-between.

Share Your Thoughts:  Do you have a long distance relationship that worked? One that didn’t? Do tell.

Supplemental Listening: Vanessa Carlton ‘A Thousand Miles’