History Main / LongDistanceRelationship

Due to RuleOfDrama, a story that has a long-distance relationship often deals with its pitfalls, the #1 being that AbsenceMakesTheHeartGoYonder. If they've promised to reunite but one party takes his / her ([[DoubleStandard generally his]]) time, it may result in IWillWaitForYou; if outside pressures force the waiting party to be with someone else, this then becomes YouHaveWaitedLongEnough. For when someone ''pretends'' they have a long-distance relationship as a transparent cover-up for actually being single, that's GirlfriendInCanada. If the person has met their love-to-be online, and never met yet in person, there's a small risk that they are being romance-scammed by a [[DatingServiceDisaster catfisher]].

Due to RuleOfDrama, a story that has a long-distance relationship often deals with its pitfalls, the #1 being that AbsenceMakesTheHeartGoYonder. If they've promised to reunite but one party takes his / her ([[DoubleStandard generally his]]) time, it may result in IWillWaitForYou; if outside pressures force the waiting party to be with someone else, this then becomes YouHaveWaitedLongEnough. For when someone ''pretends'' they have a long-distance relationship as a transparent cover-up for actually being single, that's GirlfriendInCanada.

* ''Anime/VoicesOfADistantStar'', ''Anime/FiveCentimetersPerSecond'' and ''Anime/YourName''. Creator/MakotoShinkai ''loves'' this trope.
* Koyuki and Maho in ''Manga/{{BECK}}'' but [[GeckoEnding only in the manga]].

* ''Manga/SailorMoon'':
** During the ''Sailor Stars'' arc, Mamoru went to America to study, leaving Usagi behind for a large part of the series. (And then it turns out that [[spoiler:Mamoru actually was killed by having his Star Seed ''stolen at the airport'', and Usagi witnessed it, but she was so traumatized that she repressed this memory. In the [[Anime/SailorMoon anime]] it's slightly changed; Mamoru gets killed off a little after his plane took off, and since Usagi didn't see it, she truly believed Mamoru wasn't able to contact her until Galaxia shows her Mamoru's Heart Star Seed and tells her how she killed him.]].)
** A lesser example is Motoki and Reika. Reika agonizes over accepting a two-year trip to Africa because it will take her away from Motoki. He promises to wait and, after the usual monster attack, she goes. In a later season she returns, only to turn right around and go back to Africa again--this time for ''ten years.''
* The anime version of ''Manga/MarmaladeBoy'' had this for a while, when Yuu takes a scholarship and goes to study in America leaving his girlfriend Miki behind in Japan. [[spoiler: It didn't work very well though: they did their best to try maintaining their bond, but Miki is emotionally exhausted due to being pursued by other two guys and, after a rather tasteless prank from an American ClingyJealousGirl who's after Yuu, they break it off for a while and it takes them quite the time to mildly rekindle their bonds.]]

* ''Manga/CaseClosed'':
** A variant. Ran thinks that Shinichi has run off to investigate some kind of case, but in truth he's Conan, aged down thanks to plot.
** [[spoiler:Sonoko]] and her boyfriend [[spoiler:Makoto]], who's a world-ranked karate practitioner and is always travelling.
%%* Implied at the end of ''Manga/PsychoStaff''.

* ''Manga/TheConditionsForParadise'' is a GirlsLove manga that centers around the challenges of maintaining a long-distance romance.
* ''Manga/{{Planetes}}'' often deals with this, given that most of its characters are astronauts working in orbit. Some relationships even get more long-distance than most when [[spoiler: Hachimaki and Goro]] depart for Jupiter.

* In ''LightNovel/TheCircumstancesLeadingToWaltrautesMarriage'', the Valkyrie Waltraute marries the human Jack Elvan, but humans can't survive in Asgard due to the thin atmosphere and Waltraute has too many responsibilities to stay in Midgard for long. She visits Jack's house regularly for dates.
* This is how [[spoiler: Annie Brighton and Archie Cornwall]]'s relationship begins in ''Manga/CandyCandy'', with them mostly communicating through letters and occasional reunions. [[spoiler: Subverted later when they start attending the same BoardingSchool and begin officially dating.]]
* [[ChildhoodFriendRomance Kou and Tina]] from ''Manga/TonariNoKashiwagiSan'' started off their romance this way when Kou moved back to Japan (they would visit each other during summer and winter break). Part of the reason that Tina became an exchange student was so they could be closer together (the other being that she's an OccidentalOtaku).
* ''Manga/DomesticGirlfriend'': At roughly their one-year anniversary, Natsuo's girlfriend receives a training opportunity in America. It will take a full year. Natsuo isn't happy about it but is insistent that she look at it objectively and do what she thinks is best. She does decide to leave after all, and they [[VideoPhone Skype]] as much as possible despite the time difference. Their relationship is complicated a bit because Natsuo has several girls who consider taking advantage of his girlfriend's absence to seduce him, and his girlfriend has a sex-crazed roommate who keeps trying to convince her to go on dates.
* ''Manga/AsteroidInLove'': While eventually, it's just [[spoiler:WithAFootOnTheBus]], in Episode 8 / Chapter 27 [[spoiler:Ao revealed her family's plan to move out of town.]] To some of the cast (especially [[ShipperOnDeck Moe]]), this trope is [[DefiedTrope barely prevented]] for [[PseudoRomanticFriendship Ao and Mira]]; the "emergency meeting" the Earth Sciences Club had over it is more like brainstorming for ideas on how to maintain a long-distance relationship, to the point Moe suggested taking turns to be each other's "weekend commuter wife".[[note]]Rejected as too expensive.[[/note]]
* This is respectively defied and downplayed with two different couples in ''Manga/KaguyaSamaLoveIsWar'':
** [[spoiler:The reason Tsubame gives for turning down Ishigami after the Christmas party is because she's graduating and going away to college in three months. She doesn't feel that such a relationship would work out in the long run. It's worth pointing out that she is lying about this and just using it as a cover for her CommitmentIssues (since the college is less than half an hour away by train and she already told Kaguya in an earlier chapter that such an excuse would just sound like a roundabout way of telling him that she doesn't like him romantically).]]
** [[spoiler:In the tail end of the series, Shirogane graduates early and begins attending Stanford University. While one would think that this would be an issue for his relationship with Kaguya, the fact that video chatting apps are so ubiquitous in the modern day makes this a non-issue (and Kaguya is also rich enough that taking a private jet to see him every weekend is an inconvenience at worst).]]

[[folder:Fan Fiction]]

-->'''Ryoko''': You will be living separately for several years soon. Can you keep her happy in such a situation? Perhaps someone going to the same university would be more appropriate. Someone reliable and with a vested interest in her happiness.
-->'''Souji''': So would an arranged marriage, if you're concerned about promises and commitment. Were you planning on arranging a marriage for her? If that's the case, you've waited a very long time to do so. And she hardly seems the sort to accept that at this point, if you take my meaning. As to the long-distance relationship, we've done it before, and I won't let things get between us.
-->'''Katsuhiro''': Those are easy words to say, Seta.
-->'''Souji''': No, Amagi-san, they're not. Because they mean that I won't be able to see her or be around her without a train ride to Kyoto, nor hear her in person except on holidays and after exams. There's nothing easy about what we're doing, nothing fun about it. And that's exactly why I will do everything I can to make sure that we don't grow apart just because we aren't living together.
* In ''Fanfic/OneYear'', much like Continuance, Yu and Yukiko are in a long-distance relationship for most of the fic, except for when Yu visits Inaba for Golden Week and summer vacation, while Yukiko, accompanied by Chie, visits Yu, his old friends and his parents in Minagi for Christmas and winter break. Yu and Yukiko's ultimate goal is to get into their first-choice school together, [[spoiler:and ultimately succeed in this endeavor]].

* A few of the couples in ''Fanfic/SkyholdAcademyYearbook'' have this. Most notably, [[VideoGame/DragonAgeII Hawke and Fenris]] have a long-distance ''marriage'', owing to the demands of their careers. They're still HappilyMarried, though.
* In ''Fanfic/KatawaShoujoRumblingHearts'', Hisao and Lilly have an on-and-off-again long-distance relationship. Hisao went abroad to America to continue his medical education, but the two keep in touch. At the start of the fic, Hisao decides to move back to Japan after nearly a decade.
* Cross-Clan relationships are this in ''Fanfic/WarriorsRewrite''. They're only allowed to see one another at monthly Gatherings and it's not even guaranteed that both cats will go to a Gathering. Still, they make do and oftentimes end up having kits nevertheless; once they're older, the kits choose which Clan they want to be with.

* ''Fanfic/SonOfTheSannin'': Shikamaru and Shino are respectively dating Temari and Fu, both of whom live in different ninja villages (there's mention of Choji being PenPals with his canon LoveInterest Karui, but it takes them a lot longer to have a RelationshipUpgrade). [[spoiler:After Akatsuki's temporary take over of Takigakure, Fu ends up moving into Shino's family compound for the time being as her village's leader felt that she'd be safer in Konoha until the threat can be dealt with.]]
* In the ''Fanfic/NewBeginnings'' story "Welcome to the Jungle", Page is in one [[spoiler: with Luna]].
* In [[https://www.fanfiction.net/u/6449999/AaronCottrell97 AaronCottrell97's]] ''WesternAnimation/ThomasAndFriends'' stories, both Luke and Percy are in long-distance relationships with Millie and Gina, respectively. Luke and Millie see each other more often than Percy and Gina do, however.

[[folder:Film]]

* The movie ''Film/GoingTheDistance'' is set around a couple trying to have a long-distance relationship.
* [[spoiler: Jason and Kelly]] by the end of ''Film/MysteryTeam''.
* ''Film/TheSpaceBetweenUs'' is a boy-meets-girl story where the boy in question was born in a colony on ''Mars''; it doesn't get much more long-distance than that.

* In ''Literature/The39Clues'', Amy Cahill and Evan Tolliver's long-distance relationship (carried on mostly via phone) starts after Amy takes off on a series of missions around the world.

* From the Literature/{{Honorverse}}, Eloise Pritchart and Javier Giscard, in the wake of the Theisman coup that [[spoiler:restores the old Republic]]; she is stuck in Nouveau Paris [[spoiler:being the President]], while he's commanding naval forces to subdue rogue StateSec elements. It doesn't put much of a strain on their ''relationship'', but the desperation with which they miss each other definitely takes a toll on them personally.
* The Literature/TanteiTeamKZJikenNote series: For Aya and Sunahara, that's already an improvement, as the last time Sunahara appears in ''The Egg Hamburg Steak Knows'' the entire set up looks more like a case of StarCrossedLovers. ''The Valentine Knows'' ends with the relation between Aya and Sunahara improved to this. It is more than clear that Aya and Sunahara love each other, and they have mutually confessed in this arc. However, Sunahara's [[TheInfiltration brush]] with the JapaneseDelinquents [[NotEvilJustMisunderstood seriously bruised his reputation]] in town, so he declared ButNowIMustGo. Although he promised to meet each other. Sunahara pretty much [[CommutingOnABus Commutes On A Bus]], but he does come back once every few novels.
-->'''Sunahara''': Tachibaba... We can see each other, right?
-->'''Aya''': We can, right?
-->'''Sunahara''': (Looks at Aya's ChocolateOfRomance) Yeah, I promise.
* ''Literature/DogsDontTalk'': Just as Ben is starting a relationship with MilitaryBrat Emily, her family is moved. The two attempt a long-distance relationship for a few months, but in the end Emily breaks it off, saying they need to move on without each other.
* ''Literature/TheEvolutionOfEmily'': [[TomboyishName Sam]]'s boyfriend Nate graduated last year and is now attending Dartmouth. His quiet pensivity, which was attractive in person, makes having a Skype relationship with him difficult. Sam plans to break up with him during Thanksgiving break.

* ''Series/NinetyDayFIance'': The couples featured are comprised of an American and their partner from abroad, meaning much, if not all of their relationship has been across international lines. Several couples have to get used to being together physically.

* Early in ''Series/HarryAndMeghan'', the couple dates long distance as she lives in Toronto while filming ''Series/{{Suits}}'' while he lives in London.
* Ziva had one of these on ''Series/{{NCIS}}'' - cue "sympathy" from jealous Tony, as well as comments from an ex-hooker suggesting that Ziva look closer to home. Now, ''who'' could she mean?
* Kathleen and Jeff on the ''Series/TheSecretLifeOfTheAmericanTeenager'' whenever Jeff goes on one of his frequent and extended medical missions to Kenya.

* This trope is petty much the entire point of the show Ny-Lon, which is about a relationship between a girl in New York and a guy in London... which, naturally, leads to a break-up or major fight about how hard long-distance relationships are just about every other episode so that one character can dramatically fly across the ocean to re-proclaim their love. Of course, in the end [[spoiler: they break up anyway.]]

* ''Series/TheXFiles'': Mulder and Scully carry on a rather clumsily-written version of this trope in the show's final season.
* ''Series/{{Zoey 101}}'': Chase and Zoey attempt this via webcam after [[spoiler: she overhears Chase tell his roommates he's in love with her and they switch places in an attempt to be together]], but after their video date fails, the come to the conclusion that it won't work and resolve to try it for real when they're together again.
* ''Series/{{CSI}}'', post-season 9. Grissom and Sara are married, but Sara is working at the lab in Vegas, while Grissom travels and researches and lectures.
* Ted in ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'' with Victoria, his first serious girlfriend in the series when she moves to Germany for a baking scholarship. Future!Ted tells us right from the start that long-distance relationships never work. Including theirs.
* ''Series/SchittsCreek'': Stevie falls for travel blogger Emir who doesn't live in the town and travels for his job, and David refers to him as her cell phone boyfriend since they are always texting.

-->''I see your picture, I smell your skin on the empty pillow next to mine''
-->''You have only been gone ten days, but already I am wasting away''
-->''I know I'll see you again whether far or soon''
-->''But I need you to know that I care, and I miss you''

* ''VisualNovel/C14Dating'':
** If played properly, the game will have Melissa start a romantic relationship during an eight-week trip abroad. As she returns to her home country at the end of the game, any relationship she ''does'' manage to start becomes this by design.
** Shoji's parents were in one for some time, before the Internet era. This is a factor in him trusting that he and Melissa can make their relationship work in his romantic route.
** This is what kept Melissa's relationship with her high school boyfriend to last longer than it did. In the romantic route in which this comes up, she hopes that she will manage the budding relationship better.

* In ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo'', this is subverted in Lilly's route. When she reveals that [[spoiler:her parents are ordering her to return home to Scotland]], she suggests that she and Hisao could try a long-distance relationship, but Hisao knows that this would more or less be a death sentence for their relationship. [[spoiler:In the good ending, Lilly changes her mind and stays in Japan with Hisao]].

* On Isabella’s romantic path in ''VisualNovel/{{Melody}}'', the protagonist can choose this arrangement when Isabella confesses that she can’t stop thinking about their one-night stand. At the beginning, this is justified, as Isabella’s job as a flight attendant means that she can occasionally spend the night with him despite the distance. However, within a few weeks, [[spoiler:Isabella starts training to fly internationally, meaning that she and the protagonist will have to stay apart for a long time. Staying with her notwithstanding is the only way to end up with Isabella at the end of the story.]]

* The ''VisualNovel/TokimekiMemorial'' series has a couple of examples of this, most notably with [[spoiler: Kaedeko Sakura]] in ''Tokimeki Memorial 2'' and [[spoiler: Chiharu Aoki]] in ''Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side 1''. Due to the series' alignment to the far end of the idealism's side of [[SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism the Sliding Scale]] and its extremely strong [[ThePowerOfLove Power of Love]] theme, they always work out in the end.

* In ''Webcomic/BittersweetCandyBowl'', the main character Mike is dating a girl named Sandy, who moved away when they were younger.

* ''Webcomic/CheckPlease'': During Year 3, [[spoiler:Bitty and Jack are dating, but while Bitty still lives in the Haus, Jack moves to Boston. This is less of a problem compared to others, since they're only a few hours away at most when Jack isn't on the road to play. The real burden in their relationship ends up being the [[SecretRelationship secrecy]] rather than the distance.]]

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', "The Longest Distance Relationship" is entirely about this. Naturally, it's exaggerated to the most illogical extreme: Hayley finds [[spoiler: Jeff Fisher after a whole year.]] The kicker? He's contacting her [[spoiler:from space.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'': Kenny manages to have one with Kelly in "Rainforest Shmainforest" and "Spontaneous Combustion". [[ChuckCunninghamSyndrome Unfortunately, his girlfriend inexplicably disappears after Season 3]].

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls''; in the Season 2 episode "Soos and the Real Girl", Soos meets a woman named Melody who shares many of the same quirks he does, and the two hit it off. However, she's only visiting for a few days before going back to Portland, so they agree to continue the relationship via Skype. Soos is okay with this, saying he's better at talking to women through video screens anyway, and they're still together as of "Love God". [[spoiler: In the final episode, she moves back to help him run the Mystery Shack, a tourist trap he now owns.]]
* Aja from ''WesternAnimation/{{Jem}}'' lives in California while her boyfriend is off working in Britain.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'': Stumpy and his girlfriend Ursula, who he met online on a dating site.

At any rate, a story that has a long-distance relationship often deals with its pitfalls, the #1 being that AbsenceMakesTheHeartGoYonder. If they've promised to reunite but one party takes his / her ([[DoubleStandard generally his]]) time, it may result in IWillWaitForYou; if outside pressures force the waiting party to be with someone else, this then becomes YouHaveWaitedLongEnough. For when someone ''pretends'' they have a long-distance relationship as a transparent cover-up for actually being single, that's GirlfriendInCanada.

* In ''Anime/{{GunBuster}}'', Kazumi's relationship with Coach Ohta is not only long-distance, it very quickly becomes a MayflyDecemberRomance because relativistic effects means that Kazumi will outlive Ohta (and most of human civilization, as a matter of fact) by a long shot.

** During the ''Sailor Stars'' arc, Mamoru went to America to study, leaving Usagi behind for a large part of the series. (And then it turns out that [[spoiler: Mamoru actually was killed by having his Star Seed ''stolen at the airport'', and Usagi witnessed it, but she was so traumatized that she repressed this memory. In the [[Anime/SailorMoon anime]] it's slightly changed; Mamoru gets killed off a little after his plane took off, and since Usagi didn't see it she truly believed Mamoru wasn't able to contact her until Galaxia shows her Mamoru's Heart Star Seed and tells her how she killed him.]].)

* Subaru and Teana fell into this after ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaStrikers'' when their personal goals stationed them in different posts. But as Teana told [[GenkiGirl Subaru]] [[{{Tsundere}} in an annoyed tone]] when they reunited in ''Audioplay/StrikersSoundStageX'', the latter kept on bombarding her with so much e-mail that she didn't even notice the distance.

* ''Manga/DomesticGirlfriend'': At roughly their one year anniversary, Natsuo's girlfriend receives a training opportunity in America. It will take a full year. Natsuo isn't happy about it but is insistent that she look at it objectively and do what she thinks is best. She does decide to leave after all, and they [[VideoPhone Skype]] as much as possible despite the time difference. Their relationship is complicated a bit because Natsuo has several girls who consider taking advantage of his girlfriend's absence to seduce him, and his girlfriend has a sex-crazed roommate who keeps trying to convince her to go on dates.

** [[spoiler:In the tail end of the series, Shirogane graduates early and begins attending Stanford University. While one would think that this would be an issue for his relationship with Kaguya, the fact that video chatting apps are so ubiquitous in the modern day makes this a non issue (and Kaguya is also rich enough that taking a private jet to see him every weekend is an inconvenience at worst).]]

** The constantly-airborne Thomas and the mermaid Remora tried to have one of these. And then Thomas got pregnant with Marlon, making them needing to live together a necessity. [[MisterSeahorse Yes, you read that right.]] Ironically enough, years later they'd find their positions reversed: after [[spoiler: the Mars mission]] Remora becomes a professor at Havens University while Thomas becomes the landfolk's ambassador to the ocean.

* In ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo'', this is averted in Lilly's route. When she reveals that [[spoiler:her parents are ordering her to return home to Scotland]], she suggests that she and Hisao could try a long-distance relationship, but Hisao knows that this would more or less be a death sentence for their relationship. [[spoiler:In the good ending, Lilly changes her mind and stays in Japan with Hisao]].

* Late into ''Webcomic/CrossHeart'' Kotomi has to move away. [[spoiler:Her girlfriend proposes to her and they pretend to get married]]. The next chapter takes place after a three-year timeskip and the now 21-year old Haru is dealing pretty poorly with it. She's considerably more somber and depressed than before. [[spoiler:On her birthday she is reunited with Kotomi and not too long later they achieve their high school dream of living together.]]

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', "The Longest Distance Relationship" is entirely about this. Naturally, it's exaggerated to the most illogical extreme: Hayley finds [[spoiler: Jeff Fisher after a whole year.]] The kicker? He's contacting her [[spoiler: from space.]]

** A non-romantic example occurrs in ''A Sitch in Time'' when Ron's family moves to Norway (courtesy of Future Shego). Despite Kim saying they can still make Team Possible work, two times, Ron shows up late to the mission, and when they're finally together, they're out of sync, so they regrettably agree that Kim should go solo. Fortunately, Ron accidentally hits the ResetButton and causes everything to go back to normal.

* On Isabella’s romantic path in ''VisualNovel/{{Melody}}'', the protagonist can choose this arrangement when Isabella confesses that she can’t stop thinking about their one-night stand. At the beginning, this is justified, as Isabella’s job as a flight attendant means that she can occasionally spend the night with him despite the distance. However, within a few weeks, [[spoiler:Isabella starts training to fly internationally, meaning that she and the protagonist will have to stay apart for a long time. Staying with her notwithstanding is the only way to end up with Isabella at the end of the story.]]
* The ''VisualNovel/TokimekiMemorial'' series has a couple of examples of this, most notably with [[spoiler: Kaedeko Sakura]] in ''Tokimeki Memorial 2'' and [[spoiler: Chiharu Aoki]] in ''Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side 1''. Due to the series' alignment to the far end of the idealism's side of [[SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism the Sliding Scale]] and its extremely strong [[ThePowerOfLove Power of Love]] theme, they always work out in the end.

* HK-47 in ''VideoGame/{{Knights Of The Old Republic II|TheSithLords}}'' states: "Definition: 'Love' is making a shot to the knees of a target 120 kilometers away using an Aratech sniper rifle with a tri-light scope... Love is knowing your target, putting them in your targeting reticule, and together, achieving a singular purpose against statistically long odds."
* It's never explicitly stated, but it's implied that Walter and Lyn's relationship is this in ''VideoGame/FrontMission5''. Likewise for Darril and Elsa, the protagonists of ''VideoGame/FrontMission4'', who got married in between 4 and 5.
* In ''VideoGame/Persona4'' and ''VideoGame/Persona5'', any relationship your character has will become this after the events of the game, since your character ends up having to go home- it helps that in the latter case, Makoto and Haru are also graduating high school. That said, the characters' respective girlfriends aren't fazed by this, particularly because in the latter case, [[spoiler:the character had been incarcerated in juvenile hall for almost two months, giving them some idea of what it's like to be apart]].
* In ''VisualNovel/KatawaShoujo'', this is averted in Lilly's route. When she reveals that [[spoiler:her parents are ordering her to return home to Scotland]], she suggests that she and Hisao could try a long-distance relationship, but Hisao knows that this would more or less be a death sentence for their relationship. [[spoiler:In the good ending, Lilly changes her mind and stays in Japan with Hisao]].

* ''VisualNovel/C14Dating'':
** If played properly, the game will have Melissa start a romantic relationship during an eight-week trip abroad. As she returns to her home country at the end of the game, any relationship she ''does'' manage to start becomes this by design.
** Shoji's parents were in one for some time, before the Internet era. This is a factor in him trusting that he and Melissa can make their relationship work in his romantic route.
** This is what kept Melissa's relationship with her high school boyfriend to last longer than it did. In the romantic route in which this comes up, she hopes that she will manage the budding relationship better.

* ''Theatre/ComeFromAway'': Nick(from England) and Diane(from Texas) meet and fall in love while in Gander, Newfoundland. After they return to their respective homes, they try to maintain the relationship. Ten years later, when the Come From Aways held a reunion in Gander:

'''Nick''': [[BaitAndSwitch ...so I moved to Texas, and then I proposed.\\

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', "The Longest Distance Relationship" is entirely about this. Naturally, it's [[UpToEleven exaggerated to the most illogical extreme]]: Hayley finds [[spoiler: Jeff Fisher after a whole year.]] The kicker? He's contacting her [[spoiler: from space.]]

* Defied in ''Manga/KaguyaSamaLoveIsWar''. [[spoiler:The reason Tsubame gives for turning down Ishigami after the Christmas party is because she's graduating and going away to college in three months. She doesn't feel that such a relationship would work out in the long run. It's worth pointing out that she is lying about this and just using it as a cover for her CommitmentIssues (since the college is less than half an hour away by train and she already told Kaguya in an earlier chapter that such an excuse would just sound like a roundabout way of telling him that she doesn't like him romantically).]]

** A non-romantic example occurred in ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'' A Sitch in Time when Ron's family moves to Norway (courtesy of Future Shego). Despite Kim saying they can still make Team Possible work, two times, Ron shows up late to the mission, and when they're finally together, they're out of sync, so they regrettably agree that Kim should go solo. Fortunately, Ron accidentally hits the ResetButton and causes everything to go back to normal.

* In the third season finale of ''Series/StrangerThings'', Mike and Eleven plan to do this when Eleven is forced to move out of Hawkins [[spoiler:when the Byers family takes her in after Hopper is presumed killed at Starcourt Mall, and the opening of the mall forces them to move]]. However, given Mike and Eleven didn't let a GovernmentConspiracy hunting her, Hopper having to hide her for nearly a year, the machinations of the Soviet Union, or an EldritchAbomination with a grudge keep them apart, they probably view this as a minor problem. Indeed, Mike has already got permission to come visit them on Thanksgiving, and another visit around Christmas.

* ''VisualNovel/C14Dating'', if played properly, will have Melissa start a romantic relationship during an eight-week trip abroad. As she returns to her home country at the end of the game, any relationship she ''does'' manage to start becomes this by design.

* ''Literature/TheEvolutionOfEmily'': [[TomboyName Sam]]'s boyfriend Nate graduated last year and is now attending Dartmouth. His quiet pensivity, which was attractive in person, makes having a Skype relationship with him difficult. Sam plans to break up with him during Thanksgiving break.

* ''Manga/AsteroidInLove'': While eventually, it's just [[spoiler:WithAFootOnTheBus]], in Episode 8 / Chapter 27 [[spoiler:Ao revealed her family's plan to move out of town.]] To some of the cast (especially [[ShipperOnDeck Moe]]), this trope is [[DefiedTrope barely prevented]] for [[RomanticTwoGirlFriendship Ao and Mira]]; the "emergency meeting" the Earth Sciences Club had over it is more like brainstorming for ideas on how to maintain a long-distance relationship, to the point Moe suggested taking turns to be each other's "weekend commuter wife".[[note]]Rejected as too expensive.[[/note]]

* Used in ''Manga/KimiNoIruMachi'' and ended badly, when the female lead Yuzuki decided to cut off all contact with the male lead Haruto and date her dying childhood friend as a pity date. Since this is a Seo Kouji series, [[JerkAss it never crossed her mind to explain this in any way shape or form to the male lead]]. They try it again later when Haruto gets a job that requires him to move. He is initially encouraged when he finds out his senior at work has maintained a successful long-distance relationship with her boyfriend for five years. Until she shows up at his apartment distraught and begging to sleep with him since she just broke up with her boyfriend. The distance was more emotional in her case. As much as she and her boyfriend loved each other, their dreams for the future were just incompatible. Her boyfriend wanted her to quit her job and move in with him so they could raise a family, and she wanted to stay at her job. They avoided confronting the issue for years, but it finally came to a head... to which they once again break up.

* On Isabella’s romantic path in ''VisualNovel/{{Melody}}'m, the protagonist can choose this arrangement when Isabella confesses that she can’t stop thinking about their one-night stand. At the beginning, this is justified, as Isabella’s job as a flight attendant means that she can occasionally spend the night with him despite the distance. However, within a few weeks, [[spoiler:Isabella starts training to fly internationally, meaning that she and the protagonist will have to stay apart for a long time. Staying with her notwithstanding is the only way to end up with Isabella at the end of the story.]]

* ''Manga/DetectiveConan'':

** The constantly-airborne Thomas and the mermaid Remora tried to have one of these. And then Thomas got pregnant with Marlon, making them needing to live together a necessity. [[MisterSeahorse Yes, you read that right.]]