What does a team feel like to you ?

[alltoexcess]

If you feel like you're part of a couple who are a good team, what does it feel like to
You and how does it compare to previous relationships where you weren't a team.
We are in a living apart together relationship and it feels
Like we are a good team but as we only see each other at weekends , I'm
Wondering how to strengthen and develop this. It's really
Important to me as I was a lone player in my previous marriage and never want to experience that loneliness and drudgery again. Thanks .

Anyone please?

I'm not sure, personally, you can be a complete 'team' if you don't live together.

For us, it's about communication relating to day to day life, so sharing the nursery run, organising who is doing what in the house, discussing what we're doing at weekends, planning who is doing what and when with DS, giving each other space for meeting friends or indulging in hobbies. It's also the talks we have in bed at night about how our days have been and regular sex.

Watching with interest as there was no team in my previous relationship. I would imagine communicating is very important and having each others backs at all times

I feel that we are a team of sorts . We love each other , have each others backs and support reach other in every way but it can seem distant when we aren't together all
The time . I like the status quo where I live with my children.. teens and he sees his children every week. I'd prefer not to bring a man into my children's lives full time and selfishly I love being a couple without the stresses of everyday life . Plus our work schedules
Totally
Clash and would
Cause difficulty with sleeping / noise and
Routine . I could
See us moving in together in about five years when our children will hopefully attend uni in different cities.
I want to grow and develop our relationship but am at a loss as to how
To do so when we dont and
Won't be living together for the foreseeable
Future .

I think that to be a ‘team’ in the usual sense there needs to be a shared task/project other than just the relationship itself — we met running student societies, both did doctorates at different institutions simultaneously etc. These days it’s parenting, and renovating our Victorian wreck.

Do you have any examples of what you want to change? Clashing schedules must make things difficult.

I feel part of a good team but I can’t imagine how it would be if we didn’t live together and it’s grown over time so I doubt explaining what works for us would be helpful.

Why are you so keen to grow and develop the relationship when it seems perfectly gppd for both of you as it is? You might well find yourself "developing" it into somthing much less so.

For me I think a shared vision of the future and shared goals generally make you feel more of a team. DP and I also don’t live together after 10 years due to DCs schooling etc and I don’t always feel like we’re a team.

There’s a big disparity in earnings, and while he does his bit with paying for holidays and dinners etc, it’s hard to feel like a team when he’s on 6 figures and investing in forex etc while I’m on tax credits.

I’m hopeful that things will change at some point but it does leave me feeling a bit out on my own. He’s also close to his family and spends time with them when we’re apart, whereas I’m not that close to mine so don’t feel part of a larger team either.

Will be following for advice!

For those who are Living Apart Together you should join the Facebook page called Apartners (Living Apart Together).

You will get more advice from people living that way rather than on here where its pretty unusual.

Another one who lives apart from their partner. 6 years in, neither have any intention whatsoever of ever living together. The reason we are a team is we have each other's backs, make time for each other as an when required, and have a whale of a time doing mutual interest things when we're together.

I previously lived with someone for over 20 years that I shared practically no mutual interests with. Just loving someone and spending time with them isn't enough, you have to have some mutual interests that make you actually enjoy spending time together, otherwise you just end up consumed with resentment at this other person kicking around that eats into all the time you'd like to be spending doing things YOU find interesting. Eventually the love dwindled in my case, and it turned into years of utterly lonely, soul-destroying drudgery, which eventually killed off the relationship for me entirely.

You certainly don't have to live with someone in order to be a team, and it's not the case that living with someone makes you a team either. Just going through ups and downs, parenting kids, living under the same roof doesn't make you a team by itself, you have to actually want to look out for, spend time with, and have the back of the other person, and that also has to be entirely mutual and reciprocal.