<p>My son went to college dating a girl that is about 6 hours away at another college. At first, I thought it was just a security blanket to manage the transition. But they're still going strong.</p>
<p>I’m waiting to see how it all turns out.</p>
<p>My S is away at college, 7 hours away. He has a GF still in high school here, and somehow thinks he will be able to sustain the relationship. He wants to come home for Halloween weekend, then he figures it will be Thanksgiving and Christmas break. We figure after that it will be pretty hard to see her, as there will be no more trips home for a few months.</p>
<p>I am a 2nd year at college and my boyfriend from home and I are still going strong. Very strong.</p>
<p>My DS is out of college. While in college he had a long distance gf for 2 1/2 yrs. His current gf is about to be transferred across country. This will be tough. He is already looking at job opoprtunities there, but was not looking to move too quickly. We will see what happens…</p>
<p>My boyfriend was a year older than me. We dated throughout my jr and his sr year, then he went away (6 hours away) and we held tight for the whole year, seeing one another at holiday breaks. Then I went to the same college (where he was now a soph), and after 4 months, I realized he was a jerk and dumped his butt, lol.</p>
<p>It is my feeling that when two kids go off to different colleges, it is time to break up.</p>
<p>Each kid has their own separate life now, and are living in two completely different worlds.</p>
<p>Plus, each kid should be meeting new people, and not be tied down to their high school sweetheart.</p>
<p>This is not 1957, where you marry your high school sweetheart.</p>
<p>I know the kids don’t want to hear this opinion, but eventually, they will break up.</p>
<p>In the meantime, travelling to see each other, and the phone calls and emails, are a distraction from their studies, and inhibit their ability to start their new life at their new home----their college.</p>
<p>The couple can still see each other during vacation breaks, but must realize that it makes no sense to have an exclusive relationship.</p>
<p>DS had a high school girlfriend 2 yrs younger when he went to college a few hours away. They mutually agreed to breakup when he left but the girlfriend took it hard at first. Regardless, DS met a new girl at college and they have been together for 2 yrs now.</p>
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<p>Still going strong after a month? 
Give it some time. Most of these relationships will end, whether it’s at the proverbial Turkey Drop or later into the year. The long distance relationships that actually last are the exception, not the rule.</p>
<p>Our DD and her BF started “going together” (I’m sure those aren’t the words she used! LOL) in the summer after their high school graduation. In the fall, he went to a school in the mid-west and she went to an east-coast school. They visited during holiday breaks. They stayed “a couple” that first year, visiting only during school breaks. </p>
<p>Sophomore year, he transferred to an east-coast school. Since then, they visit back and forth just about every weekend.</p>
<p>We’re happy with the situation all around. They’re in a stable, committed, caring relationship. They’re both focussed on their futures. His family is/has been engaged with and supportive of both him and her. We, DD’s parents, live overseas, so her BF has “been there” for her medical support, emotional support, etc.</p>
<p>Don’t know what the future brings – but for now, we’re OK with our DD’s long distance relationship with her BF!</p>
<p>My DD is only a freshman so time will tell. They met in hs, her junior year, his senior year. He is only about an hour away from home at his college so they did well that first year of being apart. She could go and see him on occasion and he could come home. They are both very busy, he plays basketball, she is a dancer. But they made it work that first year. Now they are both in college, about 5 hours apart. He went with us to see her Family weekend. He is planning on taking the bus to see her this weekend. Once basketball starts it will be interesting to see how it all pans out. She tells me he is the one and they are really good together. Although they did have one big fight since she has been to college. It was jealousy, there were roosters in his henhouse but they worked it out. My dgt did not understand what I meant by that :)</p>
<p>You’ll have to see what happens as it has only been a month. I think these relationships are hard to sustain and in many ways, it is hard to fully embrace college social life when tied to someone else far away. </p>
<p>When my D2 went off to college, she was 16 1/2 and graduated HS after her junior year. She went to a college 6 hours away from home. She had a very nice HS boyfriend who was in her grade and so he still had senior year to do in HS and wasn’t yet leaving for college. While my D was fond of him, she knew she was going to be far away and rarely come home, nor in summers, and wanted to fully enjoy college and not be tied to someone she would rarely see. So, before she left for college, she told her BF this and broke up in the kindest way possible, though I know it was very hard for him as he wasn’t going anywhere like she was. She went off to college free to enjoy it and has had new boyfriends, though remains friendly with the HS one. I think she was rather mature about the whole thing and knew what was realistic and what would be best for her socially as she embarked on college life and so planned accordingly before she even arrived on campus.</p>
<p>My kids had three sets of friends who were couples through at least two years of high school and all of college. </p>
<p>One set (who had gone to prestigious colleges about 150 miles apart, but very inconvenient miles, not Amtrak miles), moved together to a different region, where the girl had a research job . . . and lasted all of a couple of months there before breaking up. </p>
<p>Another set – both immigrants – got married a year after the second one graduated from college. They had been about 250 Amtrak miles/4hours’ drive apart in college. That was a case, by the way, where one of the two did about 99% of the work to keep things going (the girl, of course). A very, very old-fashioned relationship, where the man is first in everything. The boy is a wonderful “catch” – a nice guy, and a budding star in his academic field – but if I were her parent I would fear trouble ahead.</p>
<p>In the last set, the girl got involved with her first boyfriend when she was a senior in high school and he a (very mature) sophomore. At the end of that year, she went to college about 600 miles away – a long bus trip, or an expensive flight (no discounts on that route). Nevertheless, they stayed together through that, and through her two summers in Eastern Europe, and through his choosing to go to an Ivy over her college . . . . And then they broke up about a month before she graduated. Another guy (on her side of the equation). So it goes.</p>
<p>But of course those are all outliers. Most high school relationships don’t survive one semester of college, much less eight of them.</p>
<p>My son met his current girlfriend when he was a high-school senior and she a junior. He is now a college sophomore in Mississippi and she a freshman in Minnesota. So far they have diligently planned their vacations to ensure time together, but I think it says a lot that she didn’t even consider applying to his college even though she would have gotten a full ride. My wife and I think they’ll break up around Christmas, and we just hope that our son doesn’t allow his pining over her to affect his grades too much, as he is prone to do, in the meantime.</p>
<p>Sigh.</p>
<p>I was really surprised last year when D1’s friends who were “high school couples” DIDN’T break up over Thanksgiving, based on CC chatter about the Turkey drop. I think there’s been a big change around this in the past few years because of social networking, Skype and texting. You can still be in constant contact with your significant other, even if you’re on different coasts. Not like back in our day when long distance phone calls were expensive and inconvenient.</p>
<p>My HS boyfriend was a year younger than I. I went to college in our town. He was smart enough that he took a couple of college classes on my campus, so I got to see him a lot. The next year, he went to a school 2,000 miles away. I visited him at Thanksiving his freshman and sophomore years. Then he came home the next month and dumped me on Christmas Eve. Wow, did that hurt! Of course, now I know it was for the best, but I can still remember the pain. </p>
<p>I do think Skype alone would make a HUGE difference. I was lucky if I got to talk to the BF once a week! We wrote each other a lot, but it’s not the same.</p>
<p>I’ve always wondered what the appeal was of picking holidays like that to break up with someone. I mean, let’s say you decide to end a relationship in mid-October – is it really necessary to string the poor guy or girl along for another month and a half just to kick them to the curb on Thanksgiving?</p>
<p>My D has been dating a boy for about a year and a half. They dated early in high school for a while and then remained close friends throughout the rest of high school. They’re both sophomores in college now and still very committed to each other, despite a 3-ish hour difference. I think it has worked so well so far because they are both busy people pursuing cherished dreams, and each is the other’s biggest cheerleader. There’s less conflict when the BF says “of course you should go dig in Peru for winter semester! It’s the chance of a lifetime and I can’t wait to hear all about it!”</p>
<p>My D can be difficult, but the BF is incredibly stable, even-keeled and generous. Heaven knows where it will end up, but it’s been a very positive relationship.</p>
<p>Starting my sophomore year of college I started a betting pool each year about when the relationship of each of the first years on the floor with a hometown honey (HTH) would end. Some couples made it past one year but it was not a lot (maybe 10%). </p>
<p>I would guess this varies by selectivity of the schools involved somewhat … I would guess highly selective schools have a higher percentage of students who prefer to move on from high school HTHs.</p>
<p>Ooops! I read the title to mean you were asking about how great-aunt-Sue and Grandpa were handling their beloved new college students being gone.</p>
<p>S1 met his GF when they were a junior (S) and sophomore (GF) at the same college. He started grad school in the same city, which gave them one more year together. Then she went to law school on the other side of the country. He is in his third year of grad school now and she is in her second year of law school. They manage to see each other almost every month and she had an internship in his city last summer. They skype and sometimes “cook together” using it. Last Christmas I remember him taking his laptop downstairs to “show her the tree”. :)</p>
<p>My HTH was an undergrad at S’s current school; I went to school 1000 miles away. We just celebrated thirty years.</p>