When you graduate from high school, anything seems possible. It feels like life has just begun. You are headed off to college, ready to leave your hometown behind; however, if you were lucky enough to graduate with your high school sweetheart, things can get complicated. A mixture of emotions flood your mind, and your overwhelming excitement about starting college makes you feel guilty knowing that you and your sweetheart won’t be at the same school any longer.

The beginning of freshman year:

Being apart from the person that knows you inside out is an anxiety like no other. College is new and shiny. It comes with more freedom than any 18 year old mind could imagine. Boundaries and rules that you and your partner had set for each other can and will slip from the mind. Feelings will get hurt. Visits will get canceled because of freak things like massive snowstorms. Phone calls will go unanswered, and texts will be ignored. Starting freshman year, even without a boyfriend or girlfriend, is stressful. Learning how to rewire your entire relationship to ensure that your partner does not feel alienated, while trying to learn the ropes at college, is a Sisyphean task. Once you think you have figured out how to get the boulder all the way up the hill, it rolls back down again.

The first summer back home:

Fights and insecurities will arise. The two of you will discuss what went wrong during the first year apart and promise to fix those problems. You will cherish the moments that you have together because you know that they are fleeting. Remember not to take them for granted because this is the time that you have to truly learn about how your person has grown while you were away.

The transformation:

Your person, the one who watched you grow all throughout high school, is no longer there everyday. You and your partner are both going through monumental changes as you go through college; and truthfully, neither of you witness many of the changes because you are experiencing different things in different places. You visit each other and only see glimpses of what the other person is going through and feeling. It is easy to get caught up in the short visits and forget to tell your partner about certain things. Sometimes, your person might make decisions that hurt you or ones that you don’t understand. Those are the hardest because it makes you feel like you don’t really know your partner like you thought you did, but you have to remember that you are changing too. Your partner will not understand all of the choices that you make either. Growing together in high school was so much easier because you were there for all of the milestones and bad days, and you could read the other’s mind. The transformation can make you feel distant from your partner.

The decision:

The decision is this: are you still in love with your partner? Are all of the challenges worth it? Does your partner still empower you and make you feel like a priority? These are the questions that you have to ask yourself, when you doubt the relationship. If you still feel all of these things, the next question you must ask is: does my partner still feel this way too? A long distance relationship is a challenge like any other relationship because it requires commitment and intense effort from both parties. It cannot be a one-way street because if it is your partner will be left feeling alone and hurt. The transformation that you both experience through college is nothing to sneeze at because it has made you both who you are. If you can both grow as individuals throughout college and still love each other as much or more than you did when you left for college, embrace it. If you cannot, that is okay too. No two relationships are the same, and it is no one’s place to tell you what to do with your relationship. Remember, you both deserve happiness, regardless of what that means