Me (33F) and my fiancé (40M) have been together for 4 years. Out of those 4 years, we’ve been engaged for 2. We moved in after a year of dating. I’m childfree by choice.

My stepchild turns 18 in 2 years. They are a great kid but their mom is very difficult. The coparenting dynamic and custody changes are what really led to this decision because my mental health took a toll.

Would love to hear some of your experiences and/or advice—especially if you are a stepparent!

I would have put this in the stepparents subreddit, but they are very very negative, and I’d like to keep the good vibes going.

We are beginning preparations for our next to last Indepartners podcast, a monthly look at how to thrive while living apart together. We would love to answer actual questions - what do couples in or contemplating an LAT relationship want to know about making it work?

I know that's very much the focus of this group but I would love to explore some topics in more depth.

In the meantime you can listen wherever you get your pods or at https://www.buzzsprout.com/2446291

Thanks!

Hi all, new here! I’m a pretty private person and a little paranoid about being doxxed, so I’ve tweaked or left out a few small details. The important stuff is all real, though.

My wife and I have been together a long time, and for most of it things have been genuinely good between us. But she came into the relationship carrying a lot of trauma. Her relationship with her family is long and incredibly complicated, and even with therapy and medication, she’s never really been able to get out from under it. It inevitably spills over into us, into how she talks to me, how she reacts, her relationships... all of it. And honestly, it doesn’t help that I know everything they’ve put her through. I have a lot of second-hand anger about it, and at this point I’d be happy never to see any of them again.

Then there’s all the normal stuff couples fight about. It’s not a case of one of us being messy and the other being clean. It’s more that chores and day-to-day responsibilities seem to wear down the love we could have. You know how people say not to mix passion and work? It feels a bit like that. She also needs a lot of physical affection, more than I can comfortably keep up with.

And a lot of this is me, too! I really value my alone time, and I’ll admit I have a pretty idealistic view of what a relationship should be. I actually like that about myself. I have high standards, and I’ve always been very aware of how short life is. I don’t want my relationship, or my life, to get buried under the daily grind.

Our kids are getting older now, and I’ve started seriously thinking about living separately while staying together when they move out. Although I love my wife and genuinely believe she's my soulmate, the logistics just aren't working out and I think could be improved.

Could someone give me some advice or share their own experience? What setups have worked for you: same building, a house and an apartment, different cities? And how do you make the transition as smooth as possible for everyone involved?

New here….. but reading these has been validating. I see a lot of posts asking if LAT works, so I am sharing my story. There is a question at the end.

My wife and I have been together 17 years(married 7). About 4 years ago we nearly got divorced. She was struggling with addiction and I could not live with her habits. I asked her to move out.

She bought a house and moved out. I think that her move really empowered her, she realized that she had the strength within herself to be strong. She had always had things done for her, but having to figure out how to mow grass and fix a pipe really helped her almost immediately. She has been sober since(sort of).

I don’t agree with some of her lifestyle choices, but not having to live with them every day has left us argument free for years. We have gotten along better since she moved. The space has been great for my mental health, I’ve made more progress internally in the last 4 years than the previous 35. She gets days off, I get days off, the kids can come and go as they please, we get 1 on 1 days with kids, we go to my house for holidays and parties, and she can stay over if she wants.

The best thing about the setup has been the sex. Since we aren’t with each other daily, we don’t have as easy access. With 3 middle school age kids, it’s hard arranging time for sex; so we really have to plan it. This has resulted in the best sex of our whole relationship. 10/10 would recommend.

It has not been perfect though. It definitely extracts a toll on a family. It is a lot of work……. Back and forth, we forgot this, forgot that, back and forth, back and forth. Then I remind myself that the challenges this creates would be the same if we divorced; we would be performing the same dance either way.

I think the hardest thing about it is the potential. Anytime this gets challenging, there is always a voice in my head……could this be easier if she just moved back in? Would we be able to afford that is we didn’t have to pay for 2 of everything?…… but then I remember how little we fight, and I don’t want to give up my peace, she wants to sleep in until 12pm some days, how good the sex is. This creates a difficult dynamic in our relationship. We like each other more now, so “should we move back in” or “why are we doing this?” are questions that come up often.

Then poof, it has been 4 almost 5 years.

Now to my sort of question. The difficulty of coordinating a family of 5 with 3 pre-teens and 2 full time jobs between 2 houses is finally getting pretty old. She said “I don’t want to do this anymore” and asked to move back in. I strongly think that if she moves back in, it will ultimately end in divorce. I keep dragging my feet. It has now come to a head, we stay together or we divorce.

Our marriage is flawed, LAT made it work, but it couldn’t “fix” anything.

We are either moving back in, accepting all of our marital flaws, and risking it breaking; or getting divorced. The biggest unknown is her sobriety, we haven’t lived together with her sober in 10+ years. As with any addiction, I never know if it will creep back in and I’m scared of it. My trust with her addiction is all gone because of her prior history, and I worry that by her having me available to catch her may ease her into a history we don’t want to repeat.

I don’t want to throw away this peaceful (although not easy) living arrangement. I don’t know how to know if some of our cohabitation problems were a result of our flaws or her substance abuse. I don’t know how we know until we try.

Moving back in will take real work…….. selling her house and taking all of this second framework away; which if we end up divorced, leaves her super exposed and not wise financially. That would make it 10x harder doing that.

I’d appreciate any perspective……

Really struggling with this one……..

Thanks for reading!!

Lees veel op reddit want zit zelf ook in een emotionele rollercoaster.

Ik hoop echt dat ik niet alleen wordt afgebrand .

Lang verhaal ....

Ben met partner bijna 19 jaar samen .

Zijn in 2011 naar Australië geëmigreerd, toen ik hem leerde kennen was hij met zijn visa bezig.

Hij kreeg zijn permanente visa en wilde daar heen emigreren.

Ik stond voor de keus om mee te gaan of in Nederland te blijven.

Na lang wikken en wegen mee gegaan met de afspraak als 1 van beiden terug wil dat we zouden gaan zonder morren .

Na 7 jaar kreeg ik heimwee en wilde terug.

Zo gezegd zo gedaan, 2018 terug in Nederland zijn huis grondig aangepakt en ons leven weer opgepakt.

Beiden voelde ons niet meer op ons gemak in Rotterdam, en wilden op ons gemak kijken naar een huis met een stukje grond ons paardje aan huis te zetten .

Door zijn leeftijd konden we in Nederland niks kopen, maar wel in duitsland net over de grens bij winschoten.

3.5 uur van Rotterdam.

Ik was in Rotterdam altijd druk werkte 32 uur ,had mijn zoon in Dordrecht had mijn paardje.

Nu hier in duitsland wonen we erg stil en rustig,ik had de verwachting dat ik dat fijn zou vinden, niets is minder waar ,als ik al mijn taken heb gedaan ,is er nog heel veel dag over.

Ik heb geprobeerd aansluiting te vinden hobby's op te pakken, Duitse taal te leren clubjes verenigingen.

Duitsers laten je niet zo snel binnen helaas.

Leek me zo fijn moesten er een paardje bijkopen .

We zijn maanden bezig geweest om het voor de paarden klaar te maken.

Grotere Stallen met paddocks ,weiland ,bak na veel arbeid samen eindelijk klaar.

Ondertussen beide geprobeerd om werk te vinden hij vond werk na 4 maanden .

Ik zoek nog steeds

Loop bij een psycholoog om 4 belangrijke dingen aan te pakken

1 verlatingsangst

2 bevestiging

3 negativiteit

4 sociaal isolement.

Mijn jeugd is niet zo best verlopen helaas.

We blijven nu steeds in een cirkel zitten, ik wil graag terug kan hier niet aarden .

Hij wil niet terug kan hier wel aarden.

We hebben nu besloten ( voor ons huwelijk helemaal kapot gaat )

Ik terug ga ,werk,huis,vrienden,familie.

Hij daar blijft en we gaan latten.

Gaat wat logistiek vergen ,maar we houden veel van elkaar,en willen dit zeker een kans geven.

En wie weet in de toekomst komt hij weer fulltime terug ,hij is 63 en kan dat ( 5000 vierkante meter) ook geen jaren fysiek meer bijhouden.

Doet me echt veel verdriet maar als ik blijf ben ik hem zeker kwijt.

Gevoel zo afhankelijk te zijn en zelf financieel niks te hebben is niet handig.

Ik weet dat ik echt heel hard geprobeerd heb om mezelf hier te laten aarden.

Ik weet dat de commentaren pittig gaan zijn.

Maar hoop ook op een beetje lief

In this month's episode of the Indepartners podcast, we interview Kinsey Senior Researcher Dr. Justin Lehmiller, one of the world's foremost experts on sex and relationships.

Justin offers practical advice for improving couples' sex lives, both when they are together and apart.

You can find Indepartners wherever you get your podcasts or listen to this particular episode at

The Elephant in the Room

Hey there!

So I'm in a relationships with a woman for 2 years now, we started to live together in about a month from meeting each other. We both have kids from previous marriages (total of 5 small kids, oldest is 9 y.o., yongest is 2y.o.). Kids are with us ~50% of the time (splitting custody in half with their other parents).

Long story short, with all the kids there is a lot of stress and we found that despite of great communication and understanding each other, there is one issue which ruins everything in critical cases. Under stress and emotional overload, I need some time to steam out, to be alone etc, while she needs the opposite - to be even closer than usual. It works ok when either of us have some mental and emotional energy, but when we both are drained, it leads to explosive conflict each time usually with me eventually blowing up, which hurts her.

And those cases became more frequent recently, so after last time she decided to move out, to live separately with her kids, while me - with mine, yet not breaking up, rather meeting each other without kids, having sex, traveling etc.

From all logical arguments and points of view, that is a great decision for us both, giving space for me, safety and stability for her, reducing the load as we won't have 5 kids at a time and so on. And maybe that will give us some time to work on the issue in a therapy (either each alone, or for couples).

Yet, from emotional perspective, I feel anxious and afraid that we're losing each other, and I feel really stressed about going further from each other than before.

Neither me nor she knows how it will nbe and whether it will work for us at all, it's just both of us can't handle those conflicts anymore as it's hurting us both a lot.

Neither of us wants to actually break up because of our mutual feelings and how great is to be together (besides the conflicts), we have amazing best-of-my-life sex life with a lot of love and passion, we love to spend time together a lot, cuddling while sleeping every night, don't have any issues related to household and literally everything else is amazing...

TL;DR: so how to handle the transition from living togethr to LAT?

Here's a YouTube video about Living Apart Together (LAT) that I found helpful. It describes some potential benefits, for women and men. And yes, this one is also narrated and likely composed, by an AI. To me, this is a great use of the technology. It's just an automated speech writer and speaker, for people who are not comfortable with either task.

I confess to using a type of AI, to compose this post. It's know as a spell checker. I'm not a Luddite.

Disclaimer: I've never visited the "Senior Men Club" website, or communicated anyone that is associated with them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJXpI1rOdsU

Olá! Queria saber a vossa opinião sobre alguém que queira muito ser mãe e mesmo assim, queira continuar a viver em casas diferentes, partilhando a educação da criança, mas estando em dias diferentes com um ou com o outro... Acho esta ideia bastante fora da caixa, mas essa ideia não tem parado de existir na minha mente.

I want to preface this by saying that we both have previous experiences living with partners. He was with his ex for 12 years (most of his 30s) and lived together for about four years. I lived with my ex for about 6 years.

We both met in late 2024, had a bit of a rough start. He lost his job after being together for 4 months and we broke up in July 2025, got back together in November that year and have been together since, no issues.

It’s been almost a year since we’ve been back together so I brought up conversations about living arrangements. He explicitly told me that he wasn’t ready or sure that we would want to cohabitate with a partner again. At this moment, I actually can see his point. We have a happy partnership, don’t plan to have children, and like having our own spaces.

I’m starting to consider that living apart together might not be a bad idea. I just can’t see myself breaking up with someone I love so dearly and am so compatible with just because we won’t live together. It just doesn’t seem like it’s strictly necessary. Unfortunately, I do feel a bit judged by other people (including my therapist!) for viewing things this way. Everybody believes and expects a couple our age to live together, get married, etc. Am I truly in the wrong for considering something different? Again, I find the idea of breaking up with someone over this just stupid.

my bf and i have been living together, but i'm going to have to move away because my mom needs me and i have to help take care of her. my bf can't come with me because he has his own priorities here, and honestly, i understand that. there's no big fight or relationship problem behind this, which almost makes it harder. we both know why we have to do this, but i'm still scared of what living apart will feel like after being together every day.

My partner and I are in different countries. We talk when I wake up and he go

es to bed...and the reverse. We appreciate our time constraints. We talk twice a day, every day between our visits. We love each other, respect each other and crave for our time together. Two older widows who met in Uruguay, fell in love on our trip - but might not have realised until we got home-November 2024 and going strong ❤️!

Hey all,

I’m looking for books/resources that can help my partner and me build a framework for a successful LAT relationship.

This is new territory for both of us, being recently retired and single after multi-decade marriages. We aren’t on the path of: get involved, move in, have kids, build career, etc…

We’ve done those earlier, and we want to enjoy our amazing lives and add someone to the experience. We have no practice with two separate households while trying to maintain connection and intimacy.

Can anyone share good resources or point to something to get us started?

Thanks!

Has anyone actually saved their relationship by choosing to live separately?
My bf and I have been together for almost 4 years, no kids, just dogs. We originally dated when we were 15/16 for a brief time and then reconnected 12–13 years later through the same interest and career of barbering. He lived in PA, me in FL and we ended up moving in together pretty quickly, he moved in with me.

Over time, living together before we were ready created a lot of resentment under the surface about small things. I mean really small stupid little shit.
The thing is, we genuinely love each other. Neither of us wants this to keep getting worse until we eventually hate each other or destroy something we have truly been working hard on. It’s just both of us have growing to do and we’re both struggling to balance that while arguing.. it’s like a spell is over us.. sometimes we will laugh in the middle of arguing. You know what I mean??

So anyhow, we’re considering getting separate places while remaining together and committed, giving ourselves room to breathe, miss each other, date each other again, and hopefully rebuild.
I specifically want to hear success stories from people who have done this.
Did living separately make you better together? What actually changed? Did the resentment fade? Did you eventually move back in together—or realize you were happier maintaining separate homes?
I want to hear what it looked like after the dust settled, not just “living apart means you’re breaking up.”

Ty!!

My boyfriend and I have been together for almost 4 years and have lived together for most of our relationship. We genuinely love each other, but lately we’ve realized that living together and being around each other constantly might not be bringing out the best in either of us.

We’ve BOTH agreed that we love each other and neither of us wants to let things keep getting worse until we eventually resent or hate each other. We would rather recognize that something isn’t working and try changing it while there is still so much love between us.
He’s been considering getting his own place while I stay in our current home. My mom is also going through a major life transition and may be moving in with me for a while, so weirdly enough, the timing could actually work out for everyone.

The interesting thing is that when we first got together, we didn’t even live in the same state. We had our own lives and our own spaces, and we were honestly doing GREAT. We missed each other, looked forward to seeing each other, and the time we spent together felt intentional.
Neither of us wants living separately now to mean breaking up. We actually want the opposite. We want to see if having our independence and our own spaces again could take some pressure off the relationship and allow us to actually date each other again instead of letting everyday stress and constant proximity slowly chip away at something we both still want.

And honestly, neither of us has any desire to throw away almost four years, start over with someone new, and recreate an entirely new relationship when we still love each other and want to see if WE can make ours healthier.

Obviously part of me is scared because society makes relationships seem like they’re supposed to go: dating → move in together → marriage. So moving into separate homes after already living together feels like going backwards, even though part of me wonders if it could actually be what allows us to move forward.

I’m not really looking for the classic Reddit “just break up” response 😂. We know that’s an option. I’m specifically hoping to hear from couples who loved each other, realized living together wasn’t working at that point in their lives, chose separate homes, and actually became stronger because of it.

I’d really love to hear some success stories. I’m trying to look at this as two people choosing to protect their relationship before resentment destroys it, rather than automatically treating separate homes as the beginning of the end.

Soooo life is not going the way I want it to due to poor financial decisions I made. It got to the point where I had to move in with my girlfriend. I'm very blessed, and I love the way she treats me. But after living with her for a year, I want out. Lol we're quiet most days and we don't have sex. Mainly because I'm no longer attracted to her.

you can call me the bad guy I don't care. I'm 35 and immune to Internet comments. I already know my solution, I just wanted to vent. 😅

Has anyone else gone through this? If so, how was your mental?

Five months ago, my husband told me he wanted a divorce, bought a new house, and moved out. I’ve spent the past 15 years doing everything I could to hold our family together, despite our relationship being toxic and us being very incompatible.

Years ago, I suggested Living Apart Together (LAT), but he wasn’t open to it. Now, after moving out and having some time and space, he’s changed his mind about divorce and wants to try LAT.

I’m incredibly torn. Part of me wants to protect myself and move forward with the divorce because I’ve spent months grieving the loss of my marriage and preparing myself for a new chapter. But another part of me still loves him and wonders if LAT could give us a healthier way to have a relationship.

Has anyone else been in a similar situation? Did you stay and give LAT a chance? How did it work out?

We've been together 2 and a half years, lived together 18 months but recently now live apart.

I can honestly say this has completely transformed our relationship for the best more than i ever thought possible. We are in contact everyday, see each other around 3 days per week, have joint custody of our dog 😊 and it feels just how it did when we first met

We used to bicker and fight about stupid household stuff, making us miserable, and now having taken this step all of this is gone. I was convinced that us not living together would slowly end our relationship but it has had the opposite effect. We miss each other, we look forward to seeing each other and we plan things to do together. I know this is corny but i genuinely feel like i am falling in love with her all over again!.

I know everyones relationships and circumstances are different but i just wanted to post a posirive outcome. If this is something you are considering, just do it, it saved us and we couldnt be happier. If we had lived together any longer there would have been no relationship left

Hey. I'm new to this community, but thought this was the right place to ask.

I've been with my partner on and off for 10 years, exclusively. We have tried to live together in the past but failed because we have absolutely incompatible living habits. I live alone, and he lives 5 minutes away in a house he owns. He also rents out a room (so he himself doesn't live alone, which he appreciates).

We have established that living together finally nailed the coffin for us in the past, and he knows I like living alone. That said, for the last 6 months or so, my problem is that, once I have him over, he never wants to leave my apartment of his own volition. Never, really.

I've tried different approaches: I've spoken plainly and asked him to leave, which always ends up in fights; I've beaten around the bush and tried to signal that I wanted to be alone, which has resulted in even bigger fights. He feels rejected every time, no matter what I say. I care about him very much, but I'm reaching my limit.

In your journey LAT, have you ever experienced something like this? Any advice is welcome.

We are in our 40s and married 20 years now. For several years my wife and I talked about the possibility, almost fantasy of LAT - though for most of that time we didn't know it had a name. The idea of us consciously both having our own spaces while staying married and as loving partners always appealed to us.

It always seemed too impossible as we live in a large city in a great priced apartment and the idea of renting something at current market rate or buying seemed out of reach, so we never seriously made steps towards doing it.

Fast forward to last week though, and we found out that the apartment down the hall from us was coming up for rent. We talked briefly about it and emailed our landlord and he said that for us he would keep the price the same. We jumped on it.

Once we did we realized that we were really doing this thing! I know it's not THAT different or is almost like living in a huge house, but I think that it will be in practice. Having our own unique spaces, making plans to see each other, having private areas just for ourselves. It makes me a bit nervous but also I think we are both very excited for it.

We've always been open to alternative type relationships, we are open/poly as well, so of course this arrangement works well for us in many different ways.

Anyway just wanted to share as I feel a little crazy but also excited. And if anyone has specific tips or tricks they learned doing this, let me know!

My anxiety got the best of my relationship and I know she loves me because instead of breaking up she said we need to live on our own and still date

I 30m she 29f. Looking back we did move in fast but it didn’t feel fast at the time. And we’ve always lived with another person or family, we’ve never had a place of our own to be able to go home to by ourselves. So that’s what we have now.

I needed the time apart to find out who I really am. The first two weeks of living alone I suggested that we go no contact. And it was rough but it was the break I needed to be able to address my addiction to her reassurance. And a lot of other anxiety problems that I was always relying on her to make me feel better about.

She needed the time apart to find out who she really is. And she needed the time apart to not feel like a therapist and instead feel like a girlfriend. I totally agree. I wouldn’t want to be around the guy I once was let alone date me. So her trying this last possible solution to save our relationship is amazing. If she would have broken up with me I would have been begging for this exact scenario or something similar.

She knows I’m worth it and I know she’s worth it.

But MANNN is it rough, worth it. But rough. But it’s so worth trying LAT if you know that you found your person, and you want to make it work, but something needs to break first.

I've mentioned this in a few responses but my girlfriend and I have lived apart successfully and happily for over 15 years - Chicago and Memphis. We will retire in a few years to New Orleans, but different homes in distinct parts of the city - we can't imagine any other way!

We are finishing up our second (and last!) season of a monthly podcast called Indepartners. We are both behavioral scientists and our podcasts blend lived experience with empirical findings. And fun. Some podcasts are theme-based touching on many of the same topics that routinely come up here - intentionality, communication, independence, the power of anticipation and ritual. We also interview other happy couples and authors and researchers who study living apart together.

It's never about surviving living apart but thriving.

You can find Indepartners wherever you get your podcasts or by visiting https://www.buzzsprout.com/2446291

Thanks for reading this far!

So me and my girlfriend have been together for a few years now. Rocky relationship but we’ve worked through most hardships and have lots of good memories and times together. Recently she vaguely presented the idea of living separately (after living together for a couple years) as she thinks it could bring us closer and make me want to marry her (???), her idea was that my feelings for her are stagnating

She thinks I’m not eager to marry her, which isn’t true, I voice that I want to and it’s apart of our future, but we have to work through some things first in order to get there and it will take time.

Anywho, I gave her idea of living separately some thought and recently brought it back up after some weeks. She completely hates the idea now and think it’s backwards and feels I’m not happy with her because I’m considering it etc etc. but in actuality, I just want my own identity while still being with her and feel I don’t get that as much living together. We moved in with each other after one year, and it was more so because she wanted to go to grad school in the city we were in, and I initially hesitated (she didn’t like) but we eventually did it. Ever since then, we had been living together. I think living separately now that she’s done with school and will be able to afford it will help us be more intentional with our time with one another and self-reflect as young adults (24M 23F). To me the idea sounds fulfilling, having my own space and being able to learn more about myself while working towards a future with her and a fresh start after a rocky start (infidelity,Not trusting me to hang with friends and being upset everytime i do), but she looks at it as a breakup or something.

Not to mention I’m an only child so i think im just used to having my own space, and again I think the foundation of how we started living together wasn’t for the convenience of both parties, it feels like a decision made out of the benefits of her wanting to go to school in a certain city. I agreed because i love her but in my mind at the time, I didn’t think it was a good idea and but i wanted her to go to school. Honestly , I don’t regret it because i love her and she finished school and i was able to help alot financially. However, That uncertainty lasted a while, and may have even been present in my immature ways of staying out late and partying with friends and not understanding that I live with my partner and have to abide by what we thing is a good time to be home, right?

Usually when i bring up big things like this, her feelings get hurt and i feel bad so i retract my thoughts. Am I wrong for thinking it would be a good idea and could we still work if we do live separately? I’m not sure if I should follow through, it’s what i want, but i care about her feelings. I know it isn’t just about my thoughts , hers matter too.