How do I help our relationship thrive when my partner is busy until Election Day?

September 12, 2006 1:55 PM

What are some good strategies and resources for deepening a nascent romantic relationship when your partner is in a two-month pre-election frenzy of activity?

My partner and I began dating about a month ago, and we have enjoyed a rapid expansion of intimacy and grown accustomed to spending a great deal of time together. I find the relationship very satisfying and look forward to learning more about him. However, because of his political activities, we are facing a couple of months of very limited time to spend together. I am specifically interested in hearing from people who have experience being in a relationship with someone who is campaigning as well as people who have been in my partner's situation (trying to balance a relationship with extensive political involvement).

At this time, we are avoiding my becoming extensively involved in his projects in order to allow the relationship to develop more naturally, although I do accompany him to events and fundraisers as appropriate. While these activities do provide an opportunity to be with him, they are substantially different in nature from our more unmediated interactions. We will see each other every day, as a rule, but generally very late and with multiple distractions. I want to find ways to make this time productive for us as individuals and for our relationship as well. So, here are a few questions to get the advice mill working.

Besides the loss of time together, are there any other areas of potential hardship that I should be watching for--for him or for me?

What are some non-demanding and helpful ways of showing support?

Are there relationship-themed books, biographies, or other texts that might particularly speak to this situation?

What are some strategies for both providing a sounding board for your partner's professional preoccupations and also building a safe place for him or her to reconnect to regular life?

How have election outcomes, good or bad, impacted your romantic relationships?

What is the best advice you have ever received on this topic? (And when I say best, I should say that swearing off sex during campaigning is not on the radar, so if you must suggest that, know that I will not take it :-).)

I know that many of these questions are highly dependant on the individual, but I appreciate hearing others' experiences and advice and building a broader and deeper understanding of what this relationship might entail. If you prefer to contact me via email, please contact partisandating [at] gmail dot com.

posted by anonymous to human relations (12 comments total)

My only input is that this is a common situation here in DC where I live and have, in the past, dated. In my experience, it's not really this 2-month frenzy of activity that will be the problem; rather, it's the next one, and the one after that, then, after the summer's over, the next one, ad nauseam. Nearly all of his friends will be focused on the same issue, or, at least, similarly focused on other issues. Vacations will nearly always be working vacations.

Many people find that kind of lifestyle exhilarating and meaningful and fulfilling. More power to you (or them, as the case may be)! But I couldn't take it.
posted by MrMoonPie at 2:28 PM on September 12, 2006

Volunteer on whatever campaign he's working on. It's a lot of fun, if exhausting. (And a real bonding and hookup scene, for that matter.)

The election outcome may or may not have an impact on his employment options, but by the time the election rolls around, everyone's too exhausted. It won't affect your relationship positively or negatively.

What may affect your relationship is that on a hard-fought campaign, people bond. It's sort of like what war's supposed to be like: you're in a fox-hole a cubicle with the same folks 18 hours a day. You eat with them, you drink with them, you eat and drink while you work, and if you actually get away for a meal, you consider yourself lucky. If it's at a real restaurant and not a Wendy's, very lucky but also surreal because you're not in the same four walls of the campaign HQ and there are people around who you don't work with day in and day out and they just don't understand the urgency and the importance of electing Candidate X.

You live and "die" with these same people you work with on the campaign, you're all fighting for the same thing and everyone knows it's over the second Tuesday of November, no excuses, no reprieves. In the last week, everyone is sleeping on the floor of the headquarters, or in each others' hotel rooms, or whatever, because it's too much wasted time to drive back to your own place just to grab an hour of sleep. And by election day, you love every one of these people you've been check-to-jowl with (except the Press people, who are arrogant aloof condescending bastards).

And for a about week after the election, you're still "walking wounded", standing around, wondering why you're not all kinds of busy and at a loss for what to do and not able to sleep now that you finally have time for it.

My point in telling you all this is, your boyfriend will be changed by the campaign, he'll be getting very close to the people on it and everyone else in his life will acquire a strange aura of unreality -- they will all be "civilians" who are "back in the world", who don't "get it", to whom he can't really explain the saliency and the immediacy and the involvement he feels in the campaign.

So if you want to be close to him, volunteer on the campaign.
posted by orthogonality at 2:40 PM on September 12, 2006 [1 favorite has favorites]

At this time, we are avoiding my becoming extensively involved in his projects

Perhaps you should just find something else to do for two months. Either he is just not that into you or else he doesn't want you to distract him from politics, whilst still getting laid. Otherwise he'd be cool with you participating at least a bit. Because if he is a political animal there will ALWAYS be something to do.

(I'm married to a Political Animal. Trust me.)
posted by konolia at 2:41 PM on September 12, 2006

Your best strategy: patience.

Be available when he's available, and understanding when he has to cancel at the last minute. I met my wife under similar circumstances (Super Bowl advertising, not politics, but the same period of intensity), and accommodating the lifestyle--which included everything from starting a date three hours late to hanging out on-site while she finished work late one night--was apparently the best thing I could have done.

Your questions alone set a good starting point for the next two months. Do your best to be both that sounding board and moment of tranquility; don't be afraid to ask him if he'd like more or less of one or the other. And as konolia notes, expect to be #2 in the priority list, not because you're not important but because the campaign is so much so.

MrMoonPie makes an equally valid point. My wife's scheduling nuttiness has not changed much since we met. I have gotten used to it, and once in a while it's actually a good thing. For example, she's been away much of the last two weeks, and I've spent the time connecting one-on-one with my friends; every once in a blue moon, I'll get to participate in something extraordinary by virtue of her career, and that's fun, too. But you do have to prepare yourself for years, not months, of the ebb and flow.
posted by werty at 2:47 PM on September 12, 2006

It almost sounds like dating a graduate student who gets lost in finals the last month of each semester, except he/she will never graduate, and if they do those behaviors tend to carry into other occupations.
posted by mecran01 at 2:51 PM on September 12, 2006

If he's an activist, what orthogonality says. And, maybe stipulate that you will have one night out together a week (or whatever), except in the last week or so before the election. Otherwise, the campaign has the potential to steamroll everything in its path.

If he's a candidate, it's more difficult. Based on seeing friends of mine date politicians: you should reflect honestly on whether he wants to be with someone who has their own high-powered independent life, or with someone who will basically become part of his political machine. That is, if you're accompanying him to events as the good girlfriend, presentable, a good conversationalist, savvy but not too forward, etc... see how comfortable you feel in that role. It might be that as time goes on, if he stays in politics, the relationship will only work if you are very comfortable playing that role. (Sorry for the doom and gloom; there are some people who will feel very comfortable playing that role, and some politicians who don't need their partner to play it -- if one of these is your situation, right on!)
posted by LobsterMitten at 3:03 PM on September 12, 2006

Nah, it's politics. You just have to wait it out. November will be here any minute.

Ultimately, if this goes anywhere, you will have to figure out if you want to deal with the constant election cycles that make all of us crazy, but for now, just wait until the polls close.
posted by CunningLinguist at 3:03 PM on September 12, 2006

Speaking as a former political animal myself, I strongly disagree with everyone saying that you should volunteer for the campaign. Yes, being in the trenches of politics/activism can be an intense bonding experience for the people involved, and I've had a lot of friendships (and previously had romantic relationships) evolve from shared political activities, but its primary function is not a social event, particularly if the person joining on isn't genuinely interested and enthusiastic about the candidate or issue at hand, completely independent of their interest in your new partner.

Activism is hard work, which isn't necessarily the best arena to continue getting to know someone you've just become involved with. You can get frazzled, impatient, angry, snappish, and exhausted when it's getting down to the wire -- not necessarily things you want to show to a brand-new partner at a very early stage of a relationship. A new partner can also be a distraction -- maybe you're flirting when you should be getting stuff done, which may not sit too well with your fellow activists. Plus, as a newcomner to the campaign, it's unlikely that the OP is going to get to be sitting in on strategy sessions the boyfriend; the OP is more likely to be stuck in another room stuffing envelopes or making "get out the vote" calls.

So, Anon, I think your main strategy here is to simply be patient and try not to overthink it. I think one month is a mite early in any relationship to be worrying about long-term coping strategies; just keep doing what you're doing (going to the public events like fundraisers, letting him talk about the day-to-day minutiae of the campaign, etc.), understand that completely focusing on you can't be his top priority right now, and stay involved in your own interests and activities. Come November, regardless of the election outcome, you can get back to getting to know each other a little more easily.
posted by scody at 3:34 PM on September 12, 2006

I agree with scody 110%. Volunteering on the campaign is not the best route here.

You will not likely see him as much as you fantasize... you will possibly have to be in an employee-type subordinate role to him, if he is high enough up in the campaign to direct newbie volunteers (and, that's almost everyone, and at a post-Labor Day entry, you'd definitely be a newbie)... you might be a distraction to him... you might become a professional liability to him if you are not already experienced with campaign volunteering... and, worst of all, he might value you as one of the few non-political things left in his life right now, which you'd effectively be erasing.

Otherwise, all the other input is really spot-on. It's a very surreal time, unlike few others in a person's professional life, and as my campaign-addicted friends like to say, "from the inside you can't explain it and from the outside you can't understand."

Q: "Besides the loss of time together, are there any other areas of potential hardship that I should be watching for--for him or for me?"

A: Worry about you right now. It's only been a month, and while it's certainly feeling like more thanks to limerence, fact remains that you two don't know each other yet and you don't have an obligation to be looking out for his emotional well-being before your own.

But, be mindful that as it gets closer to November, you are going to see less of him, and the bit that you do see is in constant 24/7 work mode. So, just remind yourself that you're not getting the full experience, so to speak.

And keep in mind that when it's all over, he will be in a lull and have plenty of free time to fill, for even if he receives an appointment or job from a winning candidate, those won't really ramp up till after the new year. If you can be patient, you will surely be rewarded.

Q: What are some non-demanding and helpful ways of showing support?

A: For me, it was immensely helpful when my (then-fiance) stayed reasonably informed as to current events and political terminology. If I said "weather is killing blockwalking in Ohio 3 this weekend," or "the Deaniacs are freaking over the CQ blurb but I think Kos can combat it," it was nice to not always have to stop and translate. Of course, to be kind, I'd try to stop campaignspeak when away from the campaign... but between Labor Day and Election Day, you're never fully off or away from the campaign, depending on your role.

Not getting jealous over the time he's not spending with you, or the people with whom he is spending time, is also key. Sometimes he'll need to have beers with other people on the team, to strategize or decompress or vent in a safe environment away from HQ, and sometimes you won't be invited.

Q: How have election outcomes, good or bad, impacted your romantic relationships?

I promised my bf->fiance->husband that I would quit campaign work, actually. We looked at it critically and decided together that it wasn't good for our relationship or our family. So, I got out after the last presidential cycle. (well, I didn't have a job, either, but I didn't re-up for the mid-terms, was the point)

And, any partisan staffer will tell you: long-term emotional relationships are notoriously hard to maintain, unless the other person is also in the industry. It requires much more commitment from the activist, because it's simply not fair to constantly ask the non-activist to just suck it up. And activists find that it's just too difficult to give your boss and your team 110%, and your nights and weekends, and all your mental space, and never turn off your Blackberry... and keep an SO happy.

Hate to be a sinker, also, but as MrMoonPie alluded -- whoever he's working for... unless it's a gubernatorial campaign and he follows his candidate... it's just going to be worse in 2008. The mid-terms are usually not as busy, not as nasty, not as high-gear.
posted by pineapple at 4:22 PM on September 12, 2006

What MrMoonPie said. If you can't handle it for these two months, don't think it'll get better in the future.
posted by callmejay at 6:29 PM on September 12, 2006

What is a pre-election frenzy ?
posted by matholio at 7:49 PM on September 12, 2006

I dunno what the "political activities" are, so it's kind of hard to make a blanket recommendation. If your SO is an issue activist, caught up in some activity which seems vital to the success of his long term beliefs, such as will not present itself again in his natural life, you'd be short sighted to become petulant about the kind of issue/cause dedication that orthogonality, scody and pineapple have discussed. Perhaps much of what you like about him is tied up in his ability to become passionate and yet remain articulate about his ideals, and you respect his effort to make them part of the political landscape, and yet...

What you're describing is a 30 year old cultural cliche. This is an attitude that "Wesley" the SDS organizer and political activist in Forrest Gump, played by Geoffrey Blake, evidenced, when he apologized, outside the bus loading up for the return trip from the Washington anti-war rally, for smacking Jenny at the Panther house in Washington, when he says "It's this fucking war! Johnson, and this fucking war!" By which, I mean that a person who can commit to 24/7 availability to a "cause," no matter how noble, is probably also sending signals about his relative regard for himself, his ideas, and you.

If you're willing to play second fiddle to politics, whenever he deems it necessary, play on. If not, he's going to have to choose. This will not be pretty or painless.
posted by paulsc at 9:26 PM on September 12, 2006