After a twenty-one-year marriage, finding love later in life caught me by surprise. I knew that honest communication could make or break a relationship. When Jeff and I began our relationship, finding love was the last thing on my mind. I met Jeff when we were both in our mid-forties when our magical love story began.  For over three years, we maintained our love over thousands of miles in a long-distance relationship; traveling across borders, passports, and excellent communication were necessary.  Our long-distance communication consisted of phone calls, texting, and Facetime for over three years.  Jeff lived in Edmonton, Canada, and I was from California, USA. Our long-distance relationship began when we were both on separate vacations in Las Vegas, an unlikely place to find love later in life.  People go to Vegas for fun and frolicking, not to meet the love of your life.  For us, Vegas was the setting where our fairytale relationship began. We knew communication was key from the moment our long-distance relationship took off.  From those first hours we met in the pool in Vegas, our communication was open and vulnerable; this was the foundation of how we could sustain our love and long-distance relationship.

Both in our forties when we met, the odds were against us to sustain a long-distance relationship. If not for our communication in sharing our hearts, our long-distance relationship may not have lasted. Not only is it more challenging to find love later in life, but when you add in the long distance of living almost two thousand miles apart, communication was vital to the survival of our relationship.  Jeff and I intentionally ensured our communication was thoughtful and respectful as our love grew.  Through active and honest communication, the trust grew alongside our love.  In these moments of authentic communication, we sustained a long-distance relationship filled with love for over three years.  Building a strong foundation of love in a long-distance relationship requires patience, compassion, and unconditional love with sincere communication.

Our love and commitment for one another grew rapidly during the days we spent together traveling to see one another, but the strength and resilience of our love surpassed what we could have imagined. Those intimate moments of communication fostered trust, respect, and the kind of love I had only dreamed of.  We spent countless hours growing our love as we shared our hearts through communication while living apart.  

However, there were times, even though our love was unbreakable, when we both wondered if we would ever be able to live together and end the miles of the long-distance relationship that weighed on our hearts and emotions.  Sometimes, our communication broke down out of sheer frustration and a deep longing to be together daily.  At those times, it was crucial to lift the other one up when discouragement set in.  On numerous occasions, we were cuddled in a corner at the airport in tears near the TSA line, holding one another with gut-wrenching knots in our stomachs, yearning to be together and not wanting to say goodbye. For Jeff and I, it wasn’t the travel and planning that weighed most on us. Instead, it was our hearts.  Each time we flew back to our home country, it ripped at our hearts; those goodbyes at the airport were heart-wrenching.  So much so that we missed a few flights over those years as we struggled to let go.  We wanted time together, and due to our geographical circumstances, time was our most precious commodity. Through those years of living apart, we consistently reassured each other of the depths of our love from the most intimate parts of our hearts to make it to the next visit we would be together.  The effortless communication of our love during our long-distance relationship was vital.

Some of our most indelible memories etched on my heart were the intentional hours we devoted to one another.  Jeff and I planned methodically between our careers and personal lives to see one another on average every three weeks. One of us would fly from one end of North America to the other. Jeff and I didn’t do traditional dating; we always laughed and said, “In dog years, we had been together for at least fifty years.”  Most couples go out one to two dates a week for a few hours, whereas we would spend up to a week at a time twenty-four hours a day from the start.  One day together was like eight weeks of dating for us.  Our love grew exponentially every week and every month that passed.

Over those three years of living apart long-distance, our resolve to make our love and relationship succeed was strengthened by our vulnerable communication. After more than three years of traveling, Jeff moved from Edmonton to California, ending the long distance between us that tore at our hearts.  From that day forward, our relationship continued to evolve as we built our new life together rooted in dedication and unwavering love.