I can speak from experience, this is not an easy thing to do.  It takes a lot of TRUST on both parties, and also will power to remain faithful.  Write down your experiences if they have worked or failed while you lived in Japan.  Write down all the things you had to do and try to make things to work.

What type of dumb ass thinks this will work??? I'm being very serious when I say this because I really want to understand.

Trust your "internal warning system".
It is smarter than you!!!!!!!!

I think a majority of the American women you will date living overseas, will either be wearing a uniform (of some branch), a dependent, or a spouse.

There are not many women that up and move across the world to live in Japan unaccompanied. Most have spouses already, and are just tagging along.

I have had several friends upset, because they expected there to be more American woman to date, but he found there were only nationalities that he didnt prefer.

Some people will tell you that dating military woman are different. I never really tried to go down this path, but would like to hear from those that did.

"Trust your "internal warning system"."
That was ment for da guys.

Guys: Women got all kinds of internal warnin systems tellin dem crazy stuff, all da time! (Guys, focus on what your woman needs, if your bests not good enough, walk)

Women: dont follow this. You need evidence, Cuz, ya'lls minds aint right! Ya'll will adopt a situation from da TV, da soaps, a friend, or some crazy stuff like dat! (Women, focus on doing the best fo your children, if dats not good enough, walk)

Thats the best I can do.
good luck
(following my advice you will need it)

I don't know if you wanted this to apply to married couples too, Adam, but I will throw my 2 cents in there!

I've never quite understood why long distance relationships are so hard. Wasn't it just 15 years ago ships didn't even have email? Nowadays you can email your spouse on the ship right away and basically hear back right away, or within a day or two if the ship email is down, whatever. I'm not saying having your S/O away all the time isn't hard, what I am saying is you just make it work.
Does it suck having my husband gone for long periods of time? Hell yes. So, when he IS home I don't nitpick him for not taking out the trash or have some insane expectation he should be doing 50% of the housework. I freaking adore my husband and trust that when he's out in port he ain't getting a little on the side because I make a point of knowing his hot spots better than some 30 minute, $50 hooker. Just saying. When he's home, we have FUN together, have tons of family time, and when the kids go to sleep have tons of sex. When he is away, we write to each other via letters and email and my kids and I send care packages up the wazoo to him on the ship. I truly hate when he is gone, but my life doesn't end. I cannot imagine living hundreds of years ago wen your husband was away for 2 years or something and you hoped to get a letter telling you he was still alive.

Just my crazy opinion!

Edited to add: If your spouse is gone for a year or more, obviously that is a lot harder and takes a lot more, but I am basically talking about the main schedules of the ships here where the do come into port for a while, etc,

lmao @ you guys

I still think you are naive if you think that long distance relationships work. I have not heard anything in here that sounds like it would work.

It's not the time or the distance it's the level of maturity. Regardless of the dedication to a relationship, depending on how long a couple has been in a relationship reactions to various stimuli will differ. If one spouse is having more fun and doing more things than the other jealousy general rears its ugly head. Solution? LIE! NEVER TELL YOUR SPOUSE WHAT A GREAT TIME YOU'RE HAVING IN JAPAN, KOREA, HONG KONG OR WHERE EVER!

Think about that.

that's some great advice...lol

elzey, I'll be the first to admit that long distance relationships don't have the best track record, but I'll share my exception to the rule:

My husband and I met in 2002 and he enlisted in 2003. We were friends for awhile (he liked me, but I didn't really see him that way), and then he came home on leave in August 2004 and we hit it off romantically and started dating. I went back to college in Colorado (and the crazy, party lifestyle that comes with it) and he went back to Dam Neck, where he was stationed at the time. We made a commitment to fly out to see each other every month and talk on the phone every week. I told him from the beginning that I would not put up with any jealous behavior and that if we're going to be in a relationship, he had to trust that I would honor that commitment. He agreed and told me to go ahead and have fun with my friends, but if I cheated on him, it would be over, no questions asked.

March of 2005 he was told he had orders to Yokosuka and asked me to marry him and come with him. I knew that if I did that, I would resent that I never had the chance to finish college, so I told him that we'd get married and I'd move to Japan after college (one year later). He proposed the next month, and we both got rings, so we would remember each other and the commitment we had made. We still talked on the phone everyday (unless he was out with the ship) and he came home the following January to see me. We got married early (for paperwork reasons - sponsorship and housing list) and he went back to Japan without me. Our church wedding was 8 months later, and I arrived in Japan the following month. We have been married for four years now and have a one year old son. Luckily, our long-distance days are behind us, but we did it for 2 years and were on different continents for the first 9 months of our marriage. Sometimes we joke that our relationship was better when we were apart because it forced us to talk to each other.

I think what worked for us was effective communication, trust, patience, and setting clear boundaries. I would have gone crazy if he had accused me of cheating on him every time I went to the bars with my friends. Instead, we laughed about the awkward moments that came up when someone would offer to buy me a drink, and I'd show them my wedding band or the girls he encountered on his walks home from the train station to base (you KNOW which girls I'm talking about!!). It also helped that we each had something to keep ourselves busy instead of spending all day wondering what the other one was doing. For me, it was school, a part-time job, and my friends, and for him it was the ship and his volunteer work on base.

So, now that I've written a novel, that's my advice and that's why I think I'm qualified to give it.

long distance relationships can work. it just depends on the couple and if they are willing to make it work. Of course that means staying faithful and having trust within the relationship.

aah, the days of familygrams...... the bubbleheads know what I'm talking about.

Long distance has worked out fine for us, 12 years going strong. A lot of that spent long distance.

It really does just come down to trust. Don't trust each other that s**t don't work.