Something I'm curious about…do "friends & family" understand this process?

[Abby&Mario 100]

My husband and I met in person living in the same city so I fortunately never had to deal with what you're dealing with, but the way I see it, there are gossipy people and then there are people who are actually concerned. Tune out (or cut out) the former and try to understand the latter. New love is a literally a dopamine rush to the brain. It's chemically similar to a cocaine high, and that high will fade with time. That's just science. Some couples survive that, and others don't. Your loved ones are concerned you're not giving it enough time to be sure it's real, and they don't want to see you hurt. Can you blame them?

With that said, if anyone truly knew the secret to lifelong love, it would have been packaged and sold by now. Do what feels right to you, and if your relationship lasts, the people who are expressing concern should come around, and might even apologize for doubting you.

Best of luck on your visa journey!

[QueenComley 295]

Yes, I agree I shouldn't have shared, but when I put my vacation time in & had to tell them I was leaving the country so they wouldn't try to schedule me to work it was kind of difficult to hide it. Everyone there gossips. I didn't want everyone knowing & didn't tell anyone about my relationship/trip until 2 weeks before I left. One of the reasons being that my ex-who was friends with my fiancé- works at my store. I didn't want him to find out & think I'm with him just to piss off my ex or for him to try & get in between us. When the gossip spread, I confronted my ex & let him know what was going on (I was very mature I'm explaining it to him) he told me, before my trip, that he was happy for us & wished us the best. However, when I came back engaged, he was furious & disowned my fiancé. (We haven't talked since the breakup except for that. He cheated on me & doesn't deserve my time) my ex told my fiancé that he stabbed him in the back by getting engaged to me, which we both find laughable.

Regardless, I shouldn't have to hide it. I'm happy & want everyone to know. I'm also an open minded person. I'd like support, but I shouldn't have to hide who I'm marrying, I'm not ashamed of him. I love my British fiancé to bits & always will. Soon enough he will be here with me & there will be no way of denying our relationship. I honestly think many of them are jealous.

I completely understand Jewels7377

The reason I shared my on-line long distance relationship with work colleagues was because I felt like I shouldn't have to hide it. They were people I spend the vast majority of my life with, and they were all on my FB account anyway. I had worked there years. There was about 6 of us in the HR team, all of us similar in age and all of them were engaged to be married. I never thought I would be subject to bullying just because of my relationship status.

Although incredibly hard for them to grasp and understand, my feelings for my (now)husband were pretty clear and simple to me. I never doubted or second guessed myself or our feelings for each other. I wanted to shout it from the roof tops. They spoke of their partners all day, why the heck couldn't I? but if I did dare mutter my husbands name there would be an uncomfortable silence around the office. I mean, really Jewels7377??? Its 2014!!! Hello???!!!

Like I said in my last post to you, It was one particular colleague that made my life a living hell. Looking back it was a rather large dose of jealousy on her part. When I joined the Company I had just divorced and had never dated in the years following my divorce. This particular colleague thought that I was below her anyway and made that clear to me in the months leading up to it all. As I stated to Christeen, In hindsight I should never of had her on my FB account or divulged any details of my private life to her. but when you spend over 40 hours a week with someone, it can be kinda hard.

My other ex-colleagues do remain on my FB account, some were wonderfully supportive in my final months there, it was just a select few, so I know Jackie (the bully) knows exactly how successful my green card application, and my new life In America has been. Call me childish, but I get a certain sense of satisfaction in that, even 3 years on.

When you are bullied, jealousy does play a big part in it. The important thing is not to let outsiders ruin your relationship. If I had listened to Jackie and let the daily jibes and comments beat me down I would not have what I do now. I have my husband, who is also my best friend, and 2 step-children. I got my Green Card in March and my US Driving License in April. I have my parents visiting for the very first time next month, and after their visit I will be job hunting. Me and my husband are moving in August to a larger home for us and the kids, in a beautiful location.... there is lots to look forward to.

After days weeks, months and years of comments like "your crazy" "Your mad" Your Stupid" "your Insane" "it will never work" etc I can look back, hold my head high and say "who's the crazy, mad, stupid and insane one here Jackie???" LOL

Edited May 5, 2014 by QueenComley

[Julie+Matt 84]

I'm leaving to go visit my fiancé tomorrow!!! I'm so excited, but still...everyone at my work treats me like I'm crazy...cuz it's not a "real" relationship. It is though! And it's difficult, but so worth it. I wake up early every morning before work so we can talk for at least an hour & we have long "dates" on Sundays & my day off where we just talk for hours & kill each other in call of duty play other games. I may not be able to be with him physically, but I've never felt so close & connected to someone before & it makes me appreciate him even more.

When we were together last, it was amazing. And I'll be seeing him again in less than two days! I just wish I'd be supported. I don't care, it'd just help with the stress of being separated. Other than work, I don't go out much cuz I'm trying to save money for when he moves here & I have to support him for awhile. So, they really are the only people I talk to. And it's frustrating when they talk about their significant others & don't understand when I talk about mine. I'm also sick of seeing these women checking out other men...they're in a relationship, why are they looking? I don't do that...no other man exists for me except for Matt-even if I don't see him all the time. He's my whole world & I can't wait until all this is behind us & he's here with me forever. So, thank you to all of you for being supportive.

[kehills 217]

Jewels - I met my husband on Twitter. And we were 10,000 and change miles apart. So yeah, I get it. Some of it just has to do with how you approach things: if you project any hesitance because of fear in how others will react, they're going to pick up on it and mistake it for hesitance over your relationship. When people ask how we met, I'm honest: "oh, a mutual friend introduced us over Twitter, and suggested we talk, since we're in the same field. I ended up volunteering to edit his dissertation. Apparently brutal honesty is attractive, since doing things like scrawling 'no, rewrite' over the top of a chapter ended up with us engaged/married." The levity and the confidence, though, is what sells it. People move from "how can that be" to "how did you make it work" very quickly if you make it clear that you both acknowledge it's a bit absurd/humorous and that it's not really something to discuss.

The caveat there, of course, is probably age. I suspect the younger you are, the more prodding you get, just because the assumption will be you don't have enough life experience to decide if four days in someone's presence is enough time to get married to them.

We, for the record, decided to marry before we met. I had a cancer scare, and we both are in the same related-to-medicine field, where we knew that the laws of the US would make it difficult for him to visit me if I was indeed sick and hospitalized. I also realized that I trusted him with making medical decisions for me over anyone else. But, we went through a lot together in a short time: the PhD process is grueling, cancer scares suck, and a few other life-stress moments happened that let us test our commitment to one another.

For anyone planning on marrying someone, I'd say the important thing is to know how you deal with stress and disagreements, your ideas about money, religion, and children, and have similar life goals. Some people are friends for years and thus the decision to marry after getting involved comes quickly; some people just go through hell fast. And a lot of people don't discuss these things at all (see: high divorce rate). I'd be less worried about the time people have spent face-to-face and more concerned about what that time face-to-face was spent doing. Make sure you've seen all sides of someone (and they've seen all your sides) before marrying, regardless of if that person lives next door or 10,000 miles away.

Marriage is hard. Marrying someone who moves internationally to be with you is harder. (I say this having had a domestic marriage and divorce; immigration, moving in, getting married? That's harder than doing the more US-conventional thing of moving in, getting married later, etc.) The immigration process itself is grueling, and the person who leaves disrupts their entire life. You need to have a solid (rock solid) foundation before pursuing something that is difficult, in a system that's designed to kick the foundation of your relationship repeatedly to make sure it's legit.

[N-o-l-a 7,168]

I find it so interesting you've gotten such negative feedback. I just haven't encountered it at all despite having people constantly saying terrible things about my first husband, who I moved in with the day we met (he was terrible, so it was deserved).

Maybe people view it differently where I am from or maybe are circumstances are just different? I booked the ticket to see him a couple of weeks after we "met" online and we did not even amongst ourselves, refer to each other as being in a relationship until a while after we had met in person. That was a big leap, but people seemed to just accept it. When, after the second meeting, I told people we got engaged, everyone was really genuinely excited for us and excited for me moving to Denmark.

Alot of people in my family have married someone from another country and/or meet their current spouse online, so that probably plays into it a little. Plus, once people meet my husband they tend to really like his character and him in general, so that tends to bridge any sort of weird gap.

I'd probably just give people a dose of shut up back if they were to say hurtful comments. We have a neighbor who is always doing that sort of thing, little snide remarks, but it is just her jealousy. So, when she says things to me, I just give her a dose of brutal honest but in a jabbing sort of way. If someone makes snide remarks about the long distance, I would just tell them that because you actually get to talk and really get to know your fiancé beforehand without having to use meaningless activities or sex to obfuscate flaws in the relationship that your relationship is much more solid than it would be otherwise.