Long-distance relationships: Do they work?

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Lately, I've gotten desperate (bad social skills, people thinking I'm a maniac, etc.), because there is no girl with what I have (Aspie's, in other words) out here in the PNW.

So..... I've decided to broaden my horizons, and look outside there area. I know, LDRSes have their risks.... what am I to do? I am just... I can't some up with the word. Let's seek some advice about them (long-distance relationships), and be serious about this. I have no advice about this, sadly.

Long distance relationships require a ton of trust and faith in a person, but they can work.

It helps to have a set goal in mind for when you're going to meet up (and eventually move in together?) and constantly working towards that.

Also keeping things open at least until the first meeting is a good policy, but ultimately that's up to whatever the partners agree upon.

It's not a replacement for short-distance relationships and physical interaction. Continue working on honing your social skills with others before you first meet.

I'd say they CAN, but it's more a matter of time. My friend married a girl he met online. However they met when he was in middle school, and he married her when he was like 21, but before they were married, they knew each other in person (with her living in his house for like 3-4 months while she found a place to stay in this state) for about 2 years. So that leaves a total of....7 years or so of knowing the person? They initially met on an anime forum, and then played WoW together. She's a nice girl, just perfect for my friend, I don't think my friend would do better in a million more tries.

I talked to one other girl who worked at Radio Shack, and she met her boyfriend online and they moved in with each other. She knew him for like 2-3 years.

So it's not like they can't work or anything like that, just the main thing is time is different online, I think. In some ways, online is more intimate, and in others less, so time to get to know a person is different. Just speaking of platonic friendships, I finally met one of my internet friends in person this summer, and I've known him since like 2004 or 2005. It was quite seemless meeting him, not really a case of meeting someone from the internet and being surprised. It was like meeting someone I knew all my life, because, well, I knew him for 1/3 of it. The friendship extended past online, when I had no internet for a bit, we'd call each other, we'd send each other packages (just random things lying around our houses we didn't need anymore, but the other person could use, ie, games, clothes), those sorta things.

So in all the relationships that I've seen that were successful online, the common thread seems to be a lot of time with the other person. That's the only way I've really seen them work and transition to real life. Online is interesting in that online, in some ways you can get to know a person better, and in some ways you won't. Online sometimes we'll reveal a lot more about ourselves, our past, etc, than we will to people we know in person, just because of the anonymity of online, but then you don't get to witness the person "in action" everyday and their dealings with you and others. Or, worst case scenario, can just BS everything completely online. So that's sort of a tradeoff. The other thing is online doesn't really have a higher success rate either, you just don't have to deal with as "real" consequences for failure. Again, in my dealings with platonic friends, I used to have like 20 AIM friends, now I got like 3. People can just stop talking to you after a while, or get legitimately busy and not contact you, or just straight out tell you that you suck one day and block you.

Lastly, I think online, one thing is it does is it removes barriers. I may not have met my online friends I have now if I didn't meet them online. I just probably wouldn't have talked to them based on first appearances, but online I've had friends that were quite different than me (sometimes preppy rich kids, haha) and basically the type of people I'd have never gotten the chance to know well in real life, and it makes sorta both sides recognize I guess the shared humanity of the other person. So I don't think geography matters quite as much as that when talking to people online, though to be fair, some geographical places are better than others, and unlike others here, I don't totally discount geography as a huge factor in your social life (which is why I plan to move someday.)

So I don't write all this to dissuade you, but all I'm saying is, online isn't really magic or anything like that. And it'll likely take a lot of time for you to know the person, both know them and meet them. But there is a chance of success, so if you do wanna try, go for it. Could end up well for you, just keep those issues in mind.

I was in an online relationship for 2 and a half years and it fell apart recently because we realised that while things worked well with the distance between us, we wanted and needed very different things when it came to the being together in person part. There seems to be a bit more of a risk of falling in love with the idea of the person rather than the person themselves, but I think this happened in my relationship because of our age (we both changed/matured a lot during the course of the relationship) and the fact that throughout the entire relationship we never met in person. I guess what I'm trying to say is make sure you do try and meet the person fairly early on if you're hoping for it to progress to a real-world relationship eventually rather than it being online forever, it might avoid some complications. The great thing about using the internet though is it opens up the possibility of meeting people you never would've had a chance to speak to. I've spoken to amazing people all around the world, and even though I'm single again being able to talk to so many people in so many different places stops me from feeling lonely.

Avoid a long distance relationship, get outside and do some real socializing.

I knew a girl who fell in love on-line with some guy in New York City. She was in college and he was quite a bit older.

It worked quite well and they even had plans to get married, but then she flew to New York and met him in person. She found out real quick that she didn't want to be around him at all in real life and broke it off in a hurry.

yes, it can work. i met my boyfriend here. we first vaguely saw each other around in late 2010, then started talking in earnest in late spring of 2011. in 2 weeks i am moving in with him, thousands of miles away.

we actually chose each other over people who were interested in us in real life. but it helped that we had a goal of being together eventually, as opposed to expecting it to stay online indefinitely. we did meet in person for a week. the online chemistry carried over to real life, which was also awesome. i'd had some experience with online dating before so i kind of knew whether it was going to translate or not.

something else that helped was that in the early days we had a lot of time available to talk, so we could really interact for long stretches and get to know each other quite well.

There's nothing not "real" about knowing someone online, and having a long distance relationship doesn't mean you can't also socialize in person. Choosing to be with someone far away isn't necessarily about being incapable of "getting" someone closer, sometimes it's simply because you actually do like them and care about them more than local people.

For those who need what a strictly local relationship has to offer, there's nothing wrong with that. But for some people long distance can work, because they don't want to limit their feelings based on geography and probability.

This is the 21st century people, the prejudice of "real life" only being a small traditionally-sanctioned subset of the ways people live and interact really needs to be reevaluated.

I would suggest not looking specifically for aspie girls. They are fewer in number than men with Asperger's, so allowing the possibility for your potential gf to be NT would provide a better chance of finding one. Just make sure that let them know that have AS.

I agree with minotaurheadcheese.

It can work but it is not without its pitfalls. It all depends on the patience, trust, and understanding of the people wanting to go ahead with it. If you're going in, go in prepared and be prepared to make it work.

There is often this myth that online dating is "the last resort". I don't think it is. A man or a woman could have people throwing themselves at them locally! But what good is that if you don't like the people even at a physical level?

I don't do long distance and I think it's pointless.

It's basically like being single but with rules. You still aren't going to have a date to avoid 3rd wheeling or being alone, but if you happen to meet someone, you can't do anything.

I think it's pointless. Just remain single and try to meet someone closer to you that you can actually date.

The only time I would do LD would be if my wife/long term GF got a great job in a diff city and we had to go LD until I could get a job in the same place.

Why limit yourself to people with AS?

I'm curious why you think it's pointless to care about someone who happens not to live close by, who also feels the same way, and to enjoy that emotional bond? How is that the same as being single? Is it just because of the lack of physical contact? Or missing out on the usual idea of "dates"? What would you do if you had stronger feelings for someone distant than for the people you know in person? Would you ignore that for the sake of having a more conventional relationship with someone you liked less?

^^ Genuine questions, not being snarky, just trying to understand because I really don't.

I won't argue with the fact that there are difficulties and frustrations involved, but I think "pointless" is a very strong term. Sometimes things that require hard work, are worth the effort.

The positive to a LDR is that the focus really is on getting to know the other person. There are not the "distractions" of seeing the person and, say, making out with them for 2 hours. While those are lovely distractions, it can focus a relationship on just the physical instead of the emotional. With a LDR, the physical will never get in the way.

With that said, there are a lot of negatives. Trust is a big issue. The other person could be totally playing you and having someone else in his/her bed every night and you would never know it. Also, simple things like going to a movie or going out to dinner can simply never happen. So, frustration will set in.

The keys to success are:
1. There has to be an end date (even if it is a year into the future) to the LDR when one of you will relocate to be near the other. In that way, even though the LDR will be frustrating, there will be a "light at the end of the tunnel".
2. Trust - you both have to trust that this is "real" for both of you and neither is taking advantage of the long distance to play the other person.
3. Communication - There has to be open and honest communication. LDR are not for everyone and when one is feeling frustrated, that has to be communicated and dealt with.

LDR can definitely work as long as you go in with your eyes wide open! Good luck!

They've pretty much made up most of my relationships, if you can even call them that, and only one of them lasted a significant amount of time - maybe 2 to 2 and a half years or so. Even then, though it started off well enough, eventually I guess we both just got disinterested in each other and stopped talking, and later she'd admitted she only gave me attention because she pitied me. I'm not sure if I could really blame her for that, though. Was more than a few years back, so we were young, I was pretty immature and self absorbed and desperate for anyone to rely on. She told me everything I wanted to hear, so at least I had that.

But yeah, living across the entire US and both of us maybe having been around 14-15 at the time are probably also factors as to why it didn't work. I imagine it's very different for people who are older, know what they want, have jobs and are independent, etc. I'm older now, but still without a job and still dependent on my parents, so I've pretty much got absolutely nothing going on in my life to talk about and I can't travel too far to eventually meet anyone. I guess a lot of these problems would overlap with any kind of "normal" dating, too, so it's sort of moot, but still something to consider.

They definitely can work: I personally know a few couples where the guy and girl spent years apart, living on different continents; today they are happily married with several children.

It can work, but it tends to work for emotionally stable people who know how to be true to one another.

For certain other types of people, the idea is a disaster and will never work. I also know of such couples, where one partner wanted to plan a long-term distance relationship, but the other promptly broke up with them and found someone else nearby.