I (32f) met my current bf (32m) through gaming. I had started an anime streaming account on TikTok and posted reels and gameplay clips. He followed me and we messaged about my cosplays and I didn’t think much of it. I was playing Destiny 2 and needed a 3rd person so I asked randomly if he’d be down to play. He hopped on and we all were running missions and just talking about past relationships and things we liked and I started to enjoy everything that came out of his mouth. His sense of humor, outlook on life, and past experiences really gave me a peek into his character and personality. The gaming session lasted about 4 hours and we kinda flirted throughout the game. Once I hopped off the game I slid in his DMs like “I really like you” and he was like “I like you too” and it just took off from there. We started talking on the phone, FaceTiming, gaming pretty much consistently. I ended any type of relationship that was going on prior and told him I wanted more. What I love most is the communication and mutual respect between us. I feel like I found my best friend and lover in one. Hes introduced me to some really awesome games and is very patient with teaching me. I’m not a competitive gamer but he is so when we play PvP, I have someone who will slaughter a whole team while I’m still learning the gaming mechanics. We meet for the first time next week and I’m so excited. I have a gaming duo and an anime nerd who will talk to me for hours about his favorite games and shows. I love that we can nerd out and I can cosplay all of his favorite characters. We are going to comic con in NY together also and I’m so excited for our couple cosplays. Im just curious about anyone else finding their person through shared interests and what their experience has been

Very curious about how far everyone is from their partner, some may be 6 hours away while others may be 20 hours away. What is the distance between you and your partner? Cities away, states away, countries?

I'm talking about healthy truths that are just uncomfortable, not things like cheating or some other toxic things like that.

Gonna see mine in a few days for the first time! We’ve been so excited and haven’t been able to get off the phone (:

This seems weirdly common to me with LDRs. Do you guys not worry about being catfished? I didn't ask my girlfriend to be my girlfriend until we'd already spent months developing a friendship including calls and plenty of photos + videos + voice notes sent back and forth.

Even then, on the plane to go see her a couple months back I had a fleeting (irrational, but still) fear of "What if she's an old man who's been using really good AI?" lol. Thankfully, wasn't the case.

You lot need to be more discerning.

EDIT (PLEASE READ):

1. I'm not talking about couples who've never met. I'm talking about couples who've never seen each other's faces. Like, haven't exchanged pics.

2. Yes this is a real phenomenon. A post from someone in a relationship like this pops up a few times per month. It always baffles me. That's why I wrote this post up.

3. If it doesn't apply to you, then this post isn't directed at you! 😭 And if it does apply to you, then you need to realise you should be safer instead of getting offended.

4. No I'm not judging LDRs. I'm in a LDR. That's why internet safety is important to me and it confuses me that !!SOME!! of you don't take it seriously.

Been together 8 mmonths. Never really had a boundaries talk but he made it clear were in a committed relationship and I can't talk to other guys.. he also follows multiple girls on fb. When I brought up that he talks to other girls he freaked put and said I am the only girl he talks to then spun it on me and said I am on a dating app which I'm not only bumble bff and told him multiple times he could look at it. I just don't know what to do In this situation 😕

I don’t have an LDR at the moment but I did a couple years ago but sadly did not work out. I met her on OkCupid. I’m curious though, how did you guys meet your partners? On a dating app, in person, through gaming, on Reddit… 😂

Edit: thank you for your responses, I appreciate it!

Could be flying across the country, moving cities, staying up all night to match time zones...
I'm curious what people have done for someone they cared

Please keep this really casual. I’m asking from a place of curiosity- this is not to say things should be or shouldn’t be a certain way. To each their own x

My bf and I have been together six years. We’ve been long distance for 1.5 years of that. He’s as clueless as it gets when it comes to my period lol 😂 every time I tell him I got it, his response is usually “wasn’t it just the other week?” And it makes me crack up, because he’s genuinely confused. He’s always been supportive of me during PMS or cramps, etc. When we lived together, he’d always ask me my cravings, get my snacks, painkillers, etc.

But lately on instagram I’ve been seeing men talk about tracking their partners entire menstrual cycle (let alone just periods) and my mind has been blown 🤯 I don’t even track my cycle, I just know the names (luteal = bad). And I’ve been wondering if any of you guys/gals do the same? It’s not like I want him hyper aware or anything but it might help knowing when my hormones are fighting against me (just a girl) 😅

So, my girlfriend lives 150 miles from me. I try to get out to see her every weekend, but lately I’ve been unable to due to car trouble. For context, she’s going to college. Well, she’s started hanging out with this one guy all the time, let’s call him Johnson. I’ll admit, I’m a little uncomfortable with her hanging out with other guys because my ex cheated on me, but I still chose to trust her nonetheless. At first, she was hanging out with him only when I’m busy. Now especially these past couple of days, she’s hanging out with Johnson even when I’m trying to talk to her and call her. She’ll be spending time with him all day, any spare moment, until right when she’s ready to go to bed, she’ll call me as she’s winding down and going to sleep. I expressed to her, trying to be as polite as I could, that her actions were making me uncomfortable. She got defensive about him, saying she needs to have friends and that he’s “there for her”. He’s been giving her lots of gifts too. Well, today he texted me on her phone, telling me that I was out of line and not treating her right for what I said. I don’t believe she’s engaging in sexual activity with him, but since she’s choosing to spend her time with Johnson instead of me, is that cheating?

Edit: last night I drove the 3 hours to surprise her, genuinely trying to be nice. I got escorted out by security. Literally for showing up. Guess that pretty well answers the question. Thank you all for your help!

I’m (23F) planning to visit my long-distance boyfriend (23M) for the first time later this year and I’m not sure what to expect when it comes to splitting costs.

My round-trip flight will be around $1700 I’ll be staying for about 10-14 days. We’ll likely stay in an airbnb/hotel together and help each other with lodging with a few days at his family’s house. But just in case I’m budgeting as though I’ll cover most of the trip myself anyway. At the same time, I feel like I’m sacrificing a pretty significant amount of money to make this visit happen. And it’s not that I expect him to pay for everything. I just want the financial effort to feel somewhat balanced, especially since I’m already the one heading over.

I also keep seeing posts online where other couples have the host country person pay for most things for their visiting and I’m starting to wonder whether that has skewed my perspective. I feel bad expecting anything from him but I also don’t want to sell myself short.

For people who have visited a long-distance partner, how did you handle expenses for the first visit? Did the person traveling pay for the flight while the other person covered lodging, food, or transportation? Did you split everything evenly, divide it based on income, or handle it another way?
What arrangement felt fair to both of you? Also some tips and tricks would be greatly appreciated 🙏

She left my message on delivered for a day while being online. The day before I asked her if she was okay, and she told me that she was ill and she feelt terrible, then I told her "oh, I'm sorry about that" and asked two questions:

-what's your illness?

-Is that feeling because of illness or other things? (So she can open up to me)

She totally ignored the second one and just sent "flu"

After some hours of those messages she replied to a video I had sent a day or two before. So I decided to reply but a day later, and as usual she didn't even open the message although being online, like if she opened it but didn't reply I would understand and it would be totally fine.

She usually gets annoyed when I tell her that I was worried about her, while I acted in silence. So I decided to reach out this time.

* I usually act in silence because when I send a message, she replies after hours even though being online, and that made me feel I'm breaking into her life instead being a part of it.

Anyway, that's what happened when I tried to reach out ,

sorry for speaking long.

I’m currently at 5 months and 7 days 😭 how are you doing?

Just doing a thought experiment from my therapist to help deal with the insecurity I'm dealing with in my relationship.

Do partners really know what their LDR partners are up to most if not all the time?

In my case, my partner is asleep because time zones, but he always updates me when he wakes up and what he'll do for the day.

So if you were in a long distance relationship and it would take some years for you to be together, would you like to wait for your partner or breakup and find someone else ?

You (33M) love your partner but not in love with them crazily but she (29F) is in love with you crazily.

Also you love kids very much and want to have them.

You are 33 M and your partner is 29 F.

I would like to hear from the Europeans perspective especially Germany, Austria, Italy, France and Liechtenstein.

Also it would be nice to know from man's perspective.

EDIT. I am the girl, so I would like to know what men think.

Thank you.

My husband 21m is trying to control everything I do 21f?

Is okay what my husband is telling me?

My family is very conservative so before for me it was okay to do everything my husband wanted but it has gotten really bad like when I took my location off because we were having problems for things like I got out of work and he gets mad because I didn’t answer right after work or because I was driving and I didn’t answer the call or sometimes because my location would put me like I was right in front of the house and not inside the house when I took the location off he said he was going to leave me, that he didn’t want a woman like that etc,I log him out of my instagram because he was texting people pretending to be me mind you he never found anything because I don’t do anything of what he thinks I’m doing about the I don’t trust me thing is because I like to go to restaurants with friends with is usually one friend he knows about he used to have my location and we used to be texting all night one night my phone died and we couldn’t keep texting so he says I did it on purpose and doesn’t trust me after that but actually that’s a lie he has never trusted me and only let me go out like a few times he has broken my heart before and maked me feel humiliated 6 months ago we broke up for 1 week I found some messages of him when we came back texting other girls and looking for his ex probably texted her too I do like drinking and he always says if I ask him he will be okay with it and if I’m nice asking him that’s a lie now I can’t go to eat with friends not even in a restaurant mind u I never went to clubs because we knew it was disrespectful but I can’t take even anything or go to restaurants I really love him I’m really scared of losing a good man and I don’t really know who’s right please help (((i been writing this for a while now I got into and argument with my family because I recently knew about some things about my husband like he cheated before,someone else told me so idk if that’s completely true but that was one of his close friends all his family called me saying that they didn’t know why that friends said that I told my mom and grandma and they say it was probably my fault because I’m not living with him and because u go out and drink without him and I’m like kinda giving him away to other woman they aren’t talking to me I feel trapped I’m moving soon with him I think at the beginning of our relationship he was really controlling like really really bad he used to tell me how everything I have is because of him we broke up for 2 years and then he said he was different at the beginning he let me go take a drink or hangout with friends but then that started bothering him now I can’t do that at all I need advice please

Hi guys!
I'm 22F from Southern Ontario, Canada. I've been talking to a guy (24M) from North Carolina for about 2½ months now. We met on fb dating, and we talk literally every single day, all day. Things have honestly been going amazingly well and we've been talking about finally meeting next month, so this whole situation completely caught me off guard...

This past Friday (July 24) at 1:57 p.m., he texted me:
"Baby I just got pulled over for speeding and they're arresting me. I'll talk soon 💔💔"

That was the last I heard from him until yesterday around 9 p.m., when he messaged me again and said:
"Baby I miss you. They gave me my phone rq. I wanted to let you know I'm here for the rest of the weekend."

As soon as he said he was getting arrested on a Friday, I figured he might be there until Monday, so I wasn't completely shocked when he said he'd be there for the weekend. What I'm struggling to understand is... how does someone get arrested from a speeding stop?

I'm from Southern Ontario, and while I've gotten speeding tickets myself (and have been in the car when friends have gotten them too), I've never seen anyone arrested over speeding. Nobody even had to get out of the car. So I'm wondering if things work very differently in North Carolina or the U.S. in general.

I'm not trying to defend him or make excuses—I genuinely just don't know how this works.
For context, from everything I know about him, he doesn't drink, doesn't smoke weed, doesn't do drugs, has a regular full-time job as a tradesman, rents an apartment with his best friend, and is honestly a pretty low-key guy. Obviously, I can only go off what he's told me, but nothing about him has ever suggested criminal behaviour, which is why this whole thing feels so out of left field.

I've been trying to figure out what could have happened. I've read that maybe it could've been reckless driving, driving on a suspended licence, an old warrant, expired insurance, failure to appear on previous tickets, or something else that came up when they ran his information. He drives a sports car, so I even wondered if maybe it was something like reckless driving rather than just speeding.

I've also tried looking online because I know North Carolina has public inmate records. I've searched multiple county inmate databases, as well as statewide records, and I haven't found anything. I've also read that because this happened on a Friday, things may not be processed or updated until Monday, so maybe that's why nothing is showing up yet.

I know he's okay because he was able to message me, and I'm grateful for that. I'm not trying to play detective or invade his privacy. I also don't want to bombard him with questions the second he gets out. I'm just trying to understand what the most likely explanation is before I hear his side.

My main questions are:

1. Is it actually common in North Carolina to be arrested after getting pulled over for speeding, or does there almost always have to be something more going on?
2. If someone with no known criminal history is arrested during a traffic stop, what are the most common reasons?
3. Is it normal that I can't find him in any public inmate database yet, or could that simply be because it happened on a Friday and records haven't updated?
4. Is there anything else I might not be considering that could explain this?
5. Are there certain questions that would be more or less acceptable for me to ask him, once he's been released?

I'd really appreciate any insight, especially from people in North Carolina or anyone familiar with how traffic arrests work there. Thanks!

I also want to add that I'm not trying to judge him before I know what happened. I care about him a lot, but we've never met in person and we’re planning to meet next month. I'm just trying to understand what the possible explanations are because, as much as I like him, I also have to be smart and make sure I'm not putting myself in an unsafe situation!

I am just curious about how often you guys call with your LDR partners, do you call every day or a few times a week? Do you think every day is too much? Please tell me your opinion.

I recently met somebody randomly at an event in London a few weeks ago. We got talking and added each other on social media. We have been talking consistently everyday since we met. The only problem is that I’m from London, UK and he’s from Texas, USA. Am I being delusional in hoping that there’s even a slight chance that a potential relationship between us could work out?

If anyone has any advice or can offer some wisdom on whether long distance relationships can work that would be much appreciated. I’m not naive enough to think that pursuing anything more will be easy by any stretch, but at the same time it’s clear that we both like each other.

I’m almost one year without seeing my boo ☹️

Much wiser compared to six months ago lol. The intimacy and closeness is still pretty strong, although I’ve forgotten what he smells like 😂

How long has it been for you?

Context: we’ve never met, but this has been planned for a VERY long time. We were supposed to meet on the 25th, hurt her back moved it to Monday. Monday didn’t work because the flight got booked up, she gets on a redeye Tuesday night, but wanted to stop and see her family because her grandpa wasn’t doing well and didn’t have long. (In the end, “didn’t have long” meant a few years.

I understood at the time. I just wanted to be with her.

I’m not a passive aggressive person, and I know text has no tone.

I’m just looking for outside opinions on my message. I don’t know if I’m actually wrong or being gaslighted. Thank you.

Ive (16f) been dating my boyfriend (17m) for 4 years now and please dont judge based on age... I know to many of you its not a "real" relationship but its the most real one ive ever had.

We talk daily and used to see each other weekly and do this cute club thing through school - its complicated but basically our schools are separate, the boys school and the girls school. Sometimes they overlap and we used to do this club together and saw each other for an hour and a half every week for the first three years.

His mother hates me and controls his life and never lets me see him so it has been 434 days since I last saw him. We also can't video call because his mother is ALWAYS. THERE. Its purely on Whatsapp and Snapchat and the longer it goes on the more i feel like i no longer have a real boyfriend especially since we both start co-ed collages in a week...

I just want to know if this is still valid - whats the longest youve ever gone without seeing your partner?

edit: i knew this would happen.

1. My bf is FREASHLY 17, not even been a week, and in GB you can start driving at that age but lessons are expensive and the test is impossible to book

2. his mother is a little crazy and a helicopter parent at best. He has yet to be out in public on his own and shes extremely christian

3. I live in the countryside so there are no buses

4. I am sorry for intruding on your space as i know I'm not that far from him but I don't know what else to call it and I dont know where else to go to ask questions like these. If any of you know of a forum for "separated-by-complicated-situations" please let me know

Would love to hear your stories 😊