1. You impute motive about inconsequential things
Your girlfriend didn’t text you back, she must be ignoring you. Your boyfriend responded with a one word answer, he must not be paying attention or doesn’t care. Your best friend is making goo-goo eyes with their partner, knowing that you’re away from yours and it hurts -they must be doing it intentionally.
Small little things that happen in or around your relationship cause you to feel upset, worried or offended adding unneeded stress to your relationship. Instead of looking at those situations for what they are, you add personal motive to them, almost always a personal affront to you. And that stress can make you feel unhappy, tense or defensive about your LDR for literally no reason at all.
2. You’re sure the worst possible thing will always happen
When normal things happen in your relationship, you automatically assume the worst thing will happen. If your girlfriend says “we need to talk” you’re afraid she wants to break up. If your boyfriend goes out partying, you’re just SURE hes gonna let other girls fall all over him and cheat on you. Instead of being positive about your relationship, you’re always on the look out for something wrong.
3. You expect too much of your partner (or never voiced them)
Your girlfriend never sends you gifts, or mail or cards. How could she not know you’d love something from her when you send her gifts all the time? Your boyfriend stays out late with friends every night when he could be Skyping with you at least occasionally, how could he be so inconsiderate of your feelings?
Sometimes we expect things of our partners that they have literally no idea we expected. And most of the time those expectations aren’t even something they’d normally do. Our expectations for them are high, and yet we never voiced how we felt or what we wanted. Seems silly, doesn’t it? But it happens.
4. You let other people steal your joy & confidence in your LDR
When other people talk about your relationship in a negative way, you let them zap you of your joy. You let them make you upset, or angry. Who cares what they think?! People will always have something to say about any and everything. If you let every comment eat away at you, you’ll live a very negative unhappy life and that will affect your long distance relationship.
5. You can’t just forgive, compromise or let go, you have to win
You’re the smartest one in your relationship (no shame in that), and you tend to always be right. When you and your partner have arguments, you’re always right and you can always pull them over to your side of thinking. But just because you’re always right doesn’t mean that you should exercise that right every. single. time.
Love means being willing to compromise, forgive or let go even if you know you’re right. Because it’s not about winning, it’s about showing your partner that you care enough to not win or not be right on occasion FOR them!
6. You don’t give back to your partner, unless they give to you
It never crosses your mind to just do something special for your partner, no matter how many times you hear of other people doing it for theirs. And when reading articles about doing something special for your partner, it never occurs to you that you should be the one doing them. In fact, reading this you probably think it doesn’t apply to you because you aren’t a giver.
When it comes down to it, there are two types of people in this world. There are givers and there are takers. Givers are happier, while takers tend to be more depressed and unhappy. And we don’t mean just giving back because your partner gave you something. Show some extra love and see how much happier giving of yourself uncharacteristically will make you and your partner.
7. You don’t have a loose or concrete plan to be together soon
Without some kind of plan to be together, you’re in a never ending LDR. Having no defined end date is the equivalent of falling through the rabbit hole -a long fall with no bottom. This makes your LDR harder because you simply have no real hope to look forward to, nothing concrete to sink your feet into. Over time, this can make your LDR more stressful, especially as more time passes.
