Relationships in themselves are rocky. No relationship is perfect, and if it looks or sounds like it is, then it’s not real. Love itself is not perfect. Love is difficult and messy and takes large amounts of attention and care. You will argue and fight with the one you love. You won’t always agree on things, whether it’s how to handle something serious or what you two are going to eat for dinner.

There are only really a couple things that make being in a relationship much harder aside from the usual hardships. The most prominent of those being; long distance.

Not being able to see your significant other in the flesh is hard. Especially if before you started the long distance portion of your relationship, you were seeing them every day. That just makes it all that harder to live away from them, no matter how long they spend away from you. Yeah, it’s nice to be able to spend every day—or at least a part of every day—with your significant other. If you’re in a good relationship, you most likely enjoy doing this. But it makes being in a long distance relationship just that much harder down the road.

Whatever the reason you have to change your relationship status to “close as hell” to “*insert however many miles here* apart from each other,” it’s always going to suck. For whatever length of time it is. Maybe you’re attending college out of state and are forced to move home for the summer. Whatever reason you may have, it’s never going to feel fair, no matter how much logic might be involved.

While technology in today’s day and age is very advanced and makes video chatting and making it seem like your back with your partner, very easy. It just isn’t the same. It’s not the same chatting over some video form on a computer as it is sitting on the couch next to the one you love, their arms around you while you watch some stupid competition show about tattoos or ninjas who are apparently American.

While that can sometimes help lessen the pain of being away from your significant other, there are some other things one can do to try and help it feel a little bit easier. One of those things being that before you leave your partner for however long you have to, write them some letters. Maybe they’re “Open When…” letters. Letters like, “Open When… you’re missing me,” or “Open When… I’m not there anymore.” Little things like that. Something small and easy to make that the other person can read and hear your voice if they need a boost or something. Just a little piece of you that can help them through their day.

Another thing you can do for after you’ve already left or they’ve already left is send them a care package. Maybe just a shoebox filled with things they enjoy; another letter or small note, some of their favorite snacks and candy, a small candle or something small to remind them of you.

There are a lot of different things you can do to try and soften the blow of being such a long way away from your loved one. But in all honesty, the only thing that will truly make it better is just being with them again. We’re all just trying to get through this, one day at a time, doing whatever we can to be able to breathe a little easier.