We fall in love with whom, when or where, all out of our control. And we can’t stop where it goes and how it works then because love always comes unexpected. Me, myself had experiences the beautiful and painful of love long distance. When is the last time you heard of a successful long distance relationship? Well, nobody can be blame if those relationship going to work of fail. “Many people choose to give a long distance relationship a try, with the constant curiosity if it was the right decisions to make and if it even stands a chance,” says Alina Ruigrok, a relationship expert. I totally agree with her and I was one among maybe thousands of women who put their love into the biggest risk with hope everything going to be as usual and nothing to worry about with a little bit intention to see how deep and strong our love are.

Want to know more? Well, it’s a very sad memory to remember, but I really like to share how I go through all the difficult times and what I do to maintain the relationship. It’s not easy to keep your love alive over great distance: Distance can make people change, absences bring to a lonely heart and separation creates lies and breaks trust. So many obstacles to go through when you’re stay far from each other and of course, it not just strong love can make your relationship succeed but more: You have to put more effort and sometimes have to make some sacrifice to make it works. The question is, is it distance and being apart become the problems or it just ourselves who makes it to be a good reason for separation when your love become faint or you already find another love?

In the first few months everything seems to be okay; we always call each other and having very good conversations. Not enough with that, we always sending romantic SMS’s and writing an e-mail to each other. We try hold on to our promise to keep contact each other no matter how busy or how hard it will be. We did it very well. But how long it last? You must don’t believe it. After past three months, so many things change, suddenly, - less SMS or even e-mails, no more phone calls and when we have a chance to talk, it end up with fight. Tiring and frustrating! And you know what happens next? He didn’t contact me for a very long time and so do I. Promises? You guess where it gone. How long you can keep your promises when you two being apart?

I don’t know what I must do during those critical times: can’t see him, can’t talk to him or even cannot love him. I even don’t have any idea how our warm, beautiful relationship become frigid and frozen in a very short time. However, our promises give me a strange to fight for our loves. I started with send him SMS and write him an e-mail to say sorry. No answers. I send again and still no answer. So, I give him a call. First time, he didn’t answer the call. So, I call again the next day but I can’t reach his phone. I’m getting worry and start to call him every day, every time and anyway I can and I continuously calling up to two months. And I never give up sending him SMS and writing e-mails even it’s always end with no answers. I try many ways to contact him including through his friends but he refuse to answer me. Oh My God! I just like a crazy person, losing my way with a very painful feeling and broken heart. I know that our relationship very critical and maybe already at the dead end. I was abundant by long distance love and until now I still can feel how bitter it is. Almost two years I think - wonder why it’s happens, where he disappeared and what the reasons he leaving me without any words.

Love really mysteries. Even I felt sad and suffer knowing everything is over but I never give up trying to give him contact. I stop calling him but still write e-mails with hope he will give me the answers to all my questions. And, God listening to my prayer. One day he reply my e-mails with a very simple words says that “we’re end. And can we stay as a friend?” I stuck for a while, don’t know what to do and think and I’m not sure whether I should cry, laugh or thanks him. But, truly, I really felt relief at that time. After a moment I broke into tears but I can’t explain what emotions I had at that moment – sad, happy, thanks, blissful, painful – all in one. And from that moment I never heard about him and I try to forget everything about him. It takes some times, but now I’m really happy with my new relationship and of course I don’t choose long distance relationship. It’s not because I didn’t trust love long distance but I can’t trust when two person in love stay far away from each other.

What’s the one thing that is different between long-distance relationship and “close-distance” ones? Of course the answer is separation. Ask yourself how you feel when your loves one stay far away from you? Even for just one night – many things could happen and you never knew it. All you can do is try to believe everything he told you. Imagine that you and your loves one being apart for a very quite long times, maybe one to three years and just stay in touch through phone and e-mails – you can’t see his face, cannot touch or cares about him and cannot love him. How long you can hang on to without see his eyes and feel his love? And almost everyday you’re hunting by your longing feeling missing the times when you’re together.

And what’s the one thing can support long distance love? A promise! It has to have an equal amount of commitment from both sides because that promise is all you’ve really got to hold onto. “I love you” over the phone every day, how are you supposed to actually feel loved? You can know you’re loved, of course – he’s not liar, you know that much. But can you feel loved if you never feel his breath on your cheek or his fingers in your hair? There’s so much modern technology now a days to make communication cheaper and fulfilling, but do you think that keep the flame burning despite being apart would be easier than ever? Sadly, it’s not. That’s because the problem is never finding out how stay in touch. The problem has always been finding the will to stay in touch. If a long-distance relationship is going to fail, it’s not going to do so for lack of technology or anything else, but lack of commitment.

Nothing you can do even you have sophisticated technology if both of you are not committed to the relationship, and are ready to face the hazards a long-distance love affairs entails: Jealousy, envy, loneliness and paranoia (the cancer of all long-distance relationships – when both of you constantly worry about the other person’s level of commitment, and are afraid you’re losing them). It is important if the two of you talk about that time ahead as much as it approaches; reminding yourself that your time apart is temporary and you have all the time you’ll want with each other up ahead. And beware if your partner prefers to be vague about how long he’s going to be aware. Make sure everything is clear so you not end up waiting forever. Remember, if he really loves you and want to be with you, he wouldn’t wait for too long.

What makes things worst and your heart broken, is when people change – young people and stay in different countries. What do you expect for? He come back after three to five years and asking you to married him? Or you reunite only to find that you don’t like each other anymore? So much possibility, if the relationship survives than what? Stay in love, remains friend or just let go?

Communications: You talk, he talks and nobody is listening. You talk about your feelings, he talk about his problems, and lastly your conversations become unhappy ones, full of anger and frustration. It’s not only about telling others stories but the quality of the story is more important – remind him of all the things he loves about you, and remind yourself about the things you love about him. Don’t waste time bickering, feeling sad and crying, and never ever accuse or hint at the other person being unfaithful – because it will end your conversations faster and end up with unhappy feelings. Try to make an effort to make sure you bring joy to other person in your brief messages. Talk about happy moment you had spent together and a future both of you always dream for. Make some jokes, and lets laughter, happiness and of course love grow inside both of you. The more laughter and joyful you give each other, the happier both of you will be, and the better your odds are of making your long-distance relationship work. Never afraid to the failure, because it will teaches you how to start again. Believe in yourself, your partner and your love and your relationship will survive no matter how far or close it will be.