Long-distance, for me, is 674 miles. That number is what’s making me miss out on holidays, birthdays, and other important events with my significant other. It’s been over two years, and I am still not used to the distance. After a lot of begging, I finally agreed to go out on a date with my boyfriend on Oct. 7, 2015. We were seniors in high school and neither of us were really thinking about the future. Eventually it was the summer after graduation, and we realized it wasn’t going to be so easy for us anymore.

I started my freshman year of college, and he shipped off to boot camp. Those were some of the hardest months of my life. Looking back, I realize how important communication is in our relationship. When he left for boot camp, I felt like my whole life was turned upside down. This is because I was only allowed to communicate through letters. And those letters had to be checked by the sergeants, and if the sergeants didn’t like what I wrote, my letter would not be delivered.

This was the one point in my relationship where I questioned if it was even worth it. I had made it through almost a year of the relationship, but three months with little communication is almost what did me in. While this experience has been overwhelming, I’ve found that using communication channels, going the extra mile to communicate, and self-disclosing to my partner is what helps fight the distance.

Marianne Dainton and Brooks Aylorat, both professors of communication at La Salle University, conducted a study of partners in long-distance relationships. Their study titled “Patterns of Communication Channel Use in the Maintenance of Long-Distance Relationships” surveyed couples on how often they used different communication channels. These communication channels included calling, emailing, letter-writing and face-to-face communicating. I’m sure you’re thinking the letter-writing channel is slightly outdated, but keep in mind that’s all I had to communicate for months. Not only did the study take long-distance couples of all ages into consideration, but a large portion of the participants were college freshmen, one of the most common groups to be involved in a long-distance relationship.

The researchers concluded that talking on the phone is the most important channel of communication for maintaining a long-distance relationship. Being on the phone lets you hear your partner’s emotions, and video-chat especially helps you to see their emotions as well. This type of connection helps the couple to feel as if they’re talking face-to-face. Couples in long-distance relationships tend to use a variety of three to five communication channels each week. This confirms that channel use is key in long-distance communication.

As you may have guessed, the study also found that long-distance relationships require a bit more maintenance than geographically close relationships. This, of course, is because long-distance couples don’t have everyday interactions with their partner. These interactions are what most geographically close relationships would consider insignificant, but are crucial for communication.

Not only have communication channels made the maintenance of my relationship easier, self-disclosure has also played a large role. Self-disclosure can be defined as revealing personal information to someone else– feelings, emotions or even opinions. Although self-disclosure may sometimes make us uncomfortable, studies show that it will improve the relationship, romantically speaking.

Li Crystal Jiang and Jeffrey Hancock conducted a study to see if couples in long-distance relationships disclosed more, to feel closer to their spouse, than couples in geographically close relationships. This study was called “Absence Makes the Communication Grow Fonder: Geographic Separation, Interpersonal Media, and Intimacy in Dating.” The couples were individually given online surveys to fill out each day. They were to calculate the number of interactions they had with their partner that day, their level of self-disclosure, and the intimacy of the interaction. Geographically close relationships were asked to do the same– creating a control group for the study. As a result, they discovered that geographically close couples had a lot more interactions than long distance couples. This was because they were able to see each other in person and create that almost inevitable interaction. And of course, long distance couples had to use more mediated channels of communication, which we saw in the previous study.

Jiang and Hancock hypothesized that long-distance relationships experienced more intimacy than geographically close relationships. This was because partners in long-distance relationships were more intentional with their communication instead of relying on small talk. The researchers’ hypothesis was confirmed: long-distance couples did experience more intimacy and were more likely to be in a longer, more committed relationship than those who are geographically close. However, this was based almost completely off their disclosure.

Personally speaking, I know how important self-disclosure is in a long-distance relationship. I have to make the most out of the limited amount of time I am given to communicate with my significant other. The moments we have together, whether it’s on the phone, texting, or even letter writing, are valuable to our relationship.

It’s important to talk about topics that will bring you closer. These could be anywhere from talking about the future together and deciding what type of dog you may eventually own, to discussions about religion and the relationship you want to have with God. Of course, asking how your partner’s day was is important, but go beyond that to strive for a more intimate conversation. One of my favorite topics to discuss with my boyfriend is the future. We like to plan out how our lives will be in two years. Sometimes we talk about where we want to live, we even research houses we might like in that area. This helps us to know that long-distance isn’t permanent. The study by the professors at La Salle University even confirmed that the promise of seeing each other face-to-face will increase the commitment and satisfaction in the relationship.

Six hundred and seventy-four miles may cause me to miss a lot of special events in my boyfriend’s life, but it does not keep me from communicating, and having a satisfying relationship. Don’t get me wrong though, I am counting down the days until his contract is up, 983 days to be exact.