“I do think there are a lot more benefits than people would think with a long distance relationship,” Salloum said. Salloum said not having her partner nearby all the time is actually beneficial to her and her education, even though it is unfortunate to only see Rice through remote means or in person very sparingly. If it were up to her, she’d come down every single weekend, but I couldn’t do that to her.” “I often feel bad about how long the bus ride is and how bad the conditions ,” Salloum said. Rice does not drive, instead taking a bus down to Bowling Green. Rice comes to visit Salloum on campus roughly once a month. Rice comes to visit Salloum quite frequently to get the “college experience” on campus, but Rice is needed more at their home than at school. They are not a student anywhere as they are focusing on their family. Rice is currently not a WKU student, Salloum said. “So I’m going to try to end this year with straight A’s again and go back home and tell her that I did it in a relationship.” “They don’t know that I’m in the relationship that I’m in because my mom issued a challenge she said that I can’t both be excelling in school and also focusing on a relationship,” Salloum said. Mitch said going to a Catholic high school subjected them to some discriminatory situations, but he agrees coming to college was an “eye opening experience.” Thanks to the transition from high school to college, Jordan said he has found an environment that is more complex and diverse. “I am able, thankfully, make the three-hour drive down to Bowling Green. “We keep communicating every single day, day in and day out,” Jordan said. Even when they are apart, they keep in contact with each other. Jordan said being in a pseudo-long distance relationship has not affected their bond, because after high school and going through a pandemic, they are accustomed to having little one- on-one alone time. Since then, Mitch and Jordan have been in a three-year long committed relationship. Jordan said that’s when he realized he loved Mitch. “It sort of developed into a crush on both ends.” Debra Murrayĭuring their junior year of high school, the two attended a party together and Mitch asked Jordan the status of his attraction. “We sort of knew each other through mutual friends but then we both got into the same class together and that’s where we went from knowing each other to being friends,” Jordan said. Mitch and Jordan met because they had friends that were in the same circles. Jordan, his partner, does not attend WKU, but goes to school in eastern Kentucky. Mitch is a WKU student from Lebanon, Kentucky. The couple requested that their last names not be included in this story due to the fact that one of them is not out to their family yet. Mitch and Jordan are another couple who met each other in their Catholic high school days. All-in-all, they came to the conclusion that being open and out comes down to individual comfort levels.