A New Life: Maintaining a Relationship Isolated in a One-Bedroom Apartment

This isn’t how it was supposed to happen. I was supposed to board a plane to South Africa after a semester living with my best friends in New Building. When I came back, I would slowly move myself into a one-bedroom apartment with my boyfriend, Devan. Now I find myself in our incomplete living room on the couch we saved up to buy instead of in my common room with my roommates Anna and Molly in chairs beside me as we binge watch reality TV shows on Netflix.

When people heard that Devan and I would quickly find ourselves spending 24/7 together in the new apartment, I often received empty sarcastic remarks like, “Good luck with that!” and “I could never spend that much time with my partner but good for you!” These outside voices soon became my inner monologue and stifled the feeling of hope for a new journey and turned excitement into dread.

I turned to my therapist with all of these thoughts and she guided me to a place of security within myself and my new home. With her suggestion, I put up my own decorations alongside Devan’s, bought materials to create art, and worked on creating a culture of mutual appreciation and respect.

I spend my days now with my feet up on our new coffee table on the couch I’ve grown to love working on school assignments while Devan putters along at his corner computer desk station doing work for his software engineering job. The room is full of the sound of keyboard taps and soft snores coming from a very content puppy curled up in a blanket.

We have learned to communicate with each other, especially when it comes to the stressful parts of our lives, sometimes pushing a stressful topic about work or school to a later time to allow ourselves to decompress first. Although it’s been only a little over two weeks, I find comfort shuffling my feet at night along the rug while I find the nightlight that I can find without any other lights on. A small achievement that has big meaning to me. I love how the smell of dinner simmering in a crock pot fills the room. I love the nights enjoying each other’s company looking over our balcony with cups of hot chocolate in our hands.

Are there days that validate what others have said? Of course. “I’m sorry. Would you like me to make you a cup of coffee?” and hugs go a long way and lifts the weight in the room after the culture of mutual appreciation and respect wavered. My mother always said, “Love is a verb.” and I see how right she is now more than ever.