By Chelsey Pieretti
It’s 9 a.m.
His first class won’t begin for another four hours, but Jeremy Parker is awake and making his way to the first floor lounge of West Village B. The room is empty, so he takes the squat blue armchair at the furthest corner and props his Macbook on his lap. He clicks his mouse a few times and soon a familiar face appears on the screen, smiling.
It’s a face he doesn’t see nearly enough; a face he smiles back at immediately.
He greets his girlfriend: “Hey, Mariko, what’s up?”
Mariko Okamoto reciprocates, giddy and sipping coffee from her home in Tokyo.
In Japanese, Okamoto launches into a description of the episode of The OC she just watched.
“It’s a TV show,” whispers Parker, a 22-year-old senior history major at Northeastern, playfully cupping his hands around his mouth. “It’s not real.”
She giggles, tells him she knows and asks him how long it will be until they see each other.
He checks the calendar on his computer and looks back to her with a glint of hope in his eyes. “Three weeks,” he says.
For some of Parker’s peers, attempting a serious relationship in college is a feat in and of itself. But Parker, who met his girlfriend while on co-op in Japan, reaches far beyond in the level of devotion he is ready to commit to his partner.
He is willing to wait up to six months at a time to see her in person, because that’s what’s most accommodating to each of their schedules as full-time undergraduates. He is willing to wake up every morning between 8 a.m. and 9 a.m. because that is the most agreeable time considering the 13-hour time difference that separates them.
It may seem like Parker’s situation is rare, but the distance that separates him and Okamoto simultaneously unites the two with numerous couples across the country and around the world.
Neil Friedman, a clinical psychologist who earned his Ph.D. at Harvard and has his own popular relationship advice website, called Relationship-Talk.com, has noticed more and more of these relationships cropping up. He sees good reason behind the trend.
“Long-distance relationships are more prevalent than ever because the world is shrinking,” he said. “The Internet and text messaging allow people to be in India and Seattle and still be in as much contact as if they are both in the same city.”
And it’s no wonder many college students, like Parker, find themselves in these situations. Universities welcome students from all around the world, creating an environment in which students want both to meet new people and maintain relationships with their loved ones back home.
In this way, college is a natural haven for long-distance relationships to be created or sustained. But it’s also a place of new freedoms and fresh starts – a place that can test the willpower of those trying to blend their past with their present. Halfway through his hour-long talk with Okamoto, Parker is focused on the day ahead of him.
Okamoto asks about his schedule, and counts off on his fingers.
“Let’s see,” he starts. “Today I have math, I’m going to go get food and groceries and I’m going to make my presentation.” The conversation turns Okamoto’s way and Parker sits in silence, listening to her. It’s apparent by the way he fiddles with his hands and neck, and maintains a small smile as he watches her, that for him the next three weeks can’t pass quickly enough.
Together, apart “Damn, I Miss My long-distance Lover.”
“Chocolate Fills the Void Left by My long-distance Relationship!”
These aren’t the titles of comic romance novels or tongue-in-cheek self-help books – they’re the names of Facebook groups that boast hundreds of college and college-aged members, united to support one another.
It’s often expected that the college-aged demographic is generally not mature or prepared enough to seek out committed relationships and willingly take the necessary steps to maintain a loving bond in a healthy way. But research shows that college-aged young adults are often most likely to engage in serious long-distance relationships.
Dr. Gregory Guldner, author of “Long-Distance Relationships: The Complete Guide,” said that much of the data on long-distance relationship has been gathered from research with college students, not only because they are a widely and easily studied group, but because long-distance relationships are overwhelmingly common in the college world.
“By and large, it is much more of a norm in college students than it is in other populations,” Guldner said. “Other than the military population, college students are most likely to get support from their peers.”
Although the support of peers is helpful in maintaining personal contentment while facing the pressures of being separated from a significant other, there are also many professionals who are trained to aid these individuals in coping with the problems they’ll face in their relationships.
Therapists, coaches and even mental health professionals can help either member of the couple, or both, explore what needs to be done to ensure their bond stays exciting and strong.
With low, usually limited, income, students might not find these options preferable, but some universities provide affordable – or free – access to counselors to guide them through relationship issues.
“If [students] are having a difficult time adjusting to the separation, or feeling concerned about it, and it’s interfering with their school work, they can schedule an appointment to see a mental health counselor at the [Health and Counseling Center],” said Diane Hansen, a psychologist at the center, and the director of behavioral health at Northeastern. “Chances are, for that kind of issue, they could be seen here for a brief period of time.”
But in areas where college students are stereotypically expected to excel, like socializing, students juggling long-distance relationships often appear to suffer.
“One of the things we find is that they have a little more problem with isolating themselves from others,” Guldner said. “What happens is that they will withdraw from a support group, and that support group will stop inviting them to do things. We see that relatively frequently.”
Despite the troubles or triumphs that occur, there remains no doubt that there are a great deal of college students who are capable of being in geographically distant relationships and are up to the challenge.
Larry James suggests it isn’t a matter of their age, but the overall maturity level of any given person. The professional speaker and relationship coach said he believes there are many different stages of experience among college students and that those ultimately determine their potential success rate in a long-distance relationship.
“It depends on … just understanding what’s going on,” he said. “You know, we don’t have relationship school.”
