While at uni I miss my family, friends and of course, my boyfriend so much. I’m not going to use this blog to moan about long distance because no one wants to read that and it was my choice to live a few hours away from home. Instead, I’m going to think up 15 reasons how I could explain long distance relationships can be positive relationships. Maybe we could learn to love this distance.

 1) Number one obviously would be my education and training. I’m paying something like £9000 a year to study social work and I want to do this well. I suppose a good thing with distance is that there are less distractions without my boyfriend or family around so that I can just focus on my work while I’m here.

 2) When we do find that gap of time when both of us aren’t at work, that phone or skype call is precious and we probably pay each other more attention and value that time more than we would if we were face to face, seeing each other all the time.

 3) Being in a long distance relationship definitely demonstrates our commitment to each other. Arguably 3-4 hours isn’t that far but when we both work during the week and at weekends, there is little chance of us seeing each other at the moment. Surviving this relationship with a couple of texts and phone calls a day, and trusting each other when we go out for nights out, is promising for our relationship’s reliability.

 4) Having more ‘me’ time. This ‘me’ time might just be half an hour before bed of rubbish TV, nail painting, hair straightening or reading fiction, but that time to be you is so important to relax that you might not have a chance to do if he’s about.

 5) Because I miss that night-time hug, that phone call before bed is so precious and I usually try to stay awake to speak to him if he is working a late night shift.

 6) …But I have the bed to myself! Although I love him, if he is to crash around mine after watching a movie he snores like a dragon with a head cold! Snuggling is special but everyone likes to stretch out in bed by themselves sometimes (sorry!)

 7) Long distance gives me the chance to practice recipes I want to cook for him. I love being in the kitchen, well I’m a woman (sexist joke, I know). However, I do sometimes whip dishes up that go horribly wrong. He still eats them which must prove how much he loves me – but I am a perfectionist!

 8) Another good thing is that because we don’t live together, we don’t have silly arguments about toothpaste and toilet roll which a lot of other couples seem to have.

 9) My boyfriend jokes about me being a control-freak planner. I genuinely plan what I’m wearing months in advance. At Easter, I’m planning my summer and by September, I’ve planned Christmas. This is actually great for LDR because this way I can stick in my diary (and make him stick in his), dates when we are both available in coming weeks and plan special things to do together like meeting in London or dinner with one of our parent’s or celebrating the birthday of mutual friends. This way we are both in the bubble and have things to look forward to which we can both be a part of.

 10) ‘Distance makes the heart grow fonder.’ Ah, lovely! When we do see each other I smile like crazy and wrap around him like a monkey and don’t want to let him go (he will be cringing when he reads this but it’s true!) As much as we sometimes irritate the life out of each other, when we’re together we try to make the most of that time before we need to part again.

 11) There are always those unfortunate relationships when you wonder if your partner is just using you for your body. With long distance, this of course is not the case. You need to work on your friendship as well as romance and everything else.

 12) Someone once told me that in their long distance relationship, every time they saw their partner it felt more like a mini-holiday because they were visiting places together and doing something special. I thought that was a beautiful way to see it.

 13) We all have those friends who forget you exist when they have a new man or woman in their life. Long distance relationships give you the chance to make sure we see our friends more.

 14) In this type of relationship, you have to be independent. I can’t rely on him all of the time because we are both busy and I can’t just drive down the road to see him when I’ve had a rubbish day and need a cuddle. It has taught me to be stronger than I’ve ever been and start to embrace my own individuality and identity.
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15) Finally, with the technology of today – whatsapp and snapchat – I can sometimes trick my mind into believing that he’s not that far away at all because of all those stupid pictures we send each other.