A few days ago, I had a life-altering, earth-shattering feeling.

Dissatisfaction. Supreme dissatisfaction.

The other day, on our 22-month anniversary (yes, I count the months. I know, I know…) I realized that from now until one of us moves out, I’ll be away from my boyfriend longer than I’ve been with him.

We’re officially a legitimate long distance couple.

The past 9 months, I’ve been under the deluded idea that we’re only temporarily long distance. But I can’t hide from the facts now.

That disillusioned notion is what made it possible for me to withstand this distance. “It’s only temporary,” I’d tell myself, lonely in bed. “You’ll be together soon,” I said reassuringly when I’d see couples together on dates.

But the cold, harsh reality is, I am in a relationship where we have to schedule dates, even intimacy. I’m in a relationship where we have to weigh the cost versus the need to see each other. I am in a relationship where about 87% of the year, I’m alone. I am in a relationship that is so hard that 2 of our long distance couple friends have recently dissolved under the pressure.

All of this hit me suddenly, like the feeling you get when you wake up startled in the middle of the night.

And I was fed up.

Why should we do this to ourselves? Why put ourselves through the constant torture of missing someone you love so much? We’re young. We should be out having the time of our lives. Not drunk dialing each other, crying about how much we miss each other. Okay, maybe I’m the only one who does that, but he has to receive those calls every weekend (and some weekday) nights. That can’t be an enjoyable experience.

When I go out with my friends, I feel single. If I get any interested nibbles, I have to throw my catch back. Which I’d be more okay with if I had someone to go home to other than a very excitable, not very potty trained Maltese. I don’t want to be with anyone else. I just don’t want to be alone anymore.

So in my misery-filled, self pity party, I considered the unthinkable: life without him.

What if we just ended it? We’d be able to lead our lives without an anchor weighing us down. We wouldn’t wake up everyday looking for the other person next to us in bed. We wouldn’t see couples in the mall and have the jealous urge to stab them. (I mean, maybe we would. Some of those couples are just gross.)

But then, just like that, the self pity stopped and I realized that living with this constant longing is much more bearable than even picturing my life without him. I guess that guy Tennyson was right. It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.

Then again, I’m more of a student of Alicia Keys.

“I just want you close where you can stay forever…”