[Rommel]

Originally Posted by shaad
I have to agree with CholCholBD and Zunaid on this one. LDRs may and can work, but they are definitely not easy. The fact is that when one is young, one is still in the process of maturing, of changing and evolving; and if the two of you are not in the same locale, the odds are that you will both evolve and mature in somewhat divergent ways, and gradually grow apart from one another.

In my own case, I was involved with a young woman when we were both sophomores at Princeton. We both graduated, I went off to Stanford for my PhD, while she headed off to Harvard Law School. We continued the relationship for three more years, but by the end of it, we had both changed so much that maintaining the romance was much more stressful than not having it at all. We are still very good friends, but that's probably because we were both smart enough to end our romance before the stress destroyed our friendship too.

In contrast, I met the woman I eventually fell in love with and married towards the end of my graduate school career, when I was somewhat older and more set in my ways. I subsequently moved to Harvard to do a postdoc, so we had a little LDR going on for a while. Fortunately, she also soon moved to Boston for both another degree, and to open a new branch of her organization. Of course, as luck would have it, my job now keeps me in the DC Metro Area, while hers keeps her in Boston. So we're temporarily back to a LDR again, but what with being older and flying back and forth every other week, it's no longer such a big deal.

So I would never try to dissuade anyone from a LDR. I just want to point out that it's not easy, and that if it doesn't work out, it's not necessarily your fault or that of the person you were involved with, and that you shouldn't beat yourself up about it.

Yeah, growing apart is something I am afraid of as well. I forgot to mention one other part. She is 17. This is a problem because girls usually get married pretty early in Bangladesh. I am afraid that her Dad might lose patience and marry her off in a couple of years even if she has a bf. So right now, the only solution I see to this is early marriage for me. Maybe when I turn 18.