How do we prove our long distance relationship is genuine

[noshi11]

Here is a timeline:

March 2004: First year of university he added me on orkut (account no longer exists) and then after a couple of days on msn messanger.
2004: I told him I liked him and the feelings were mutual. We mostly chatted on msn (no record of this). Emails were exchanged but my main email account during that time got deactivated when I didn't use it for a while. I lost all the email data that was exchanged.
2005: progressed from msn to phone calls (I have record of phone calling cards bought online from 2007, but cannot find anything earlier than that since mostly I used calling cards bought from the store). Deactivated my orkut account.
2005-2006: We did not chat a lot. we mostly called each other and I used calling cards. I found a few emails exchanged between us but since mostly we talked over the phone it's just random forwarded emails etc. I found one email dated back to 2007 when we had a fight and he sent me an email response. We also started to webcam. Unfortunately I have no record of this either.
2007-2008: I finally had the courage to tell my parents. Since it was a long distance relationship I knew it was not going to go down too well. I know a lot of people didn't understand and thought it was ridiculous that we could be so serious when we never met in person. Even though we wanted to meet each other since 2004 we could not because I had to hide it from my parents and there was no way we could have met without them finding out. Even after my parents found out they would no way ever let me leave to go meet him.
2008 - 2012: Battle with parents continued for about 4 years. My relationship with him only got stronger with time and we knew for sure we wanted to get married. During this time he moved to UK to study for his masters degree. Completed his degree and currently is working there with a work permit status in UK. During this time we also switched from phone cards to skype, facetime etc.
Feb 2012: My parents finally agreed.
June 2012: My parents and his parents talked and my parents agreed to let us meet up with the condition that we get married the time we meet. Also, my parents didn't want anyone to know about our long distance relationship as this would be a disgrace to the family (in their point of view), so everything was kept a secret. My parents did not want to attend our wedding and his parents could not attend due to visa restrictions. We decided to meet up and have the wedding in UK. I booked my tickets for UK and my brother came along to attend the wedding.
Sepember 2012: We finally met each after more than 8 years of waiting. When we met, it felt like i knew him for as long as I could remember and it was no different than online/phone/facetime chats and video calls. In fact i felt like i fell in love with him all over again, but this time in person. The next day we got married. I remained in UK for 3 days and 4 nights in total. Again due to my parents restrictions I could not stay longer than that as they did not want anyone to find out about us. We did take a lot of pictures of the simple ceremony we had, dinner with his friends, bowling with his friends and him and I when we went sight seeing.

October 2012: I'm in the process of gathering evidence to prove our long distance relationship is genuine. Now I'm starting to stress out because I didn't keep record of our relationship as I should have. Knowing my parents, I never thought we would get to the point of actually getting married. We have been chatting or calling or video calling every single day from the past 8 years. The scale of evidence I gathered goes from very strong (Sept 2012) to Medium ( 2007 - 2011) to no evidence (2007-2004).

Please help! How do I prove my relationship is genuine considering we only met once and got married at the same time? Do you think I can get reference letters from friends that knew about our relationship? Should I gather a timeline (of course more detailed and better worded than the above) to show them how the relationship progressed? Should I write an essay on our relationship? Should I write about our future plans and what we have decided to do if for any reason his visa gets rejected?

This is what I have gathered so far:

facetime calls - almost ever single day from nov 2011
vibr calls - from 2011.
general emails - dated back to 2007
receipt of gift i bought him - 2011
I bought him an anti-virus software. I forwarded the key to him (lol) - 2010
facebook message sent to me from him - 2007
facebook chats - dated back to april 2011 (mostly online shopping links. we do a lot of online window shopping lol)
email exchanges on our birthdays
call log of him calling me at midnight on my birthday
he has pics of me dating back to 2004 (I don't know how we can prove that he has these from 2004)
Photos of our ceremony
greeting cards from his friends on our wedding day
skype video calls with his family after the wedding ceremony
email exchanged with the mosque that arranged the ceremony
receipt of our itinerary for the purpose of getting married
email replies between the photographer and I explaining our plans
receipt of the apartment we rented for 4 nights
copy of the marriage visit visa I obtained in order to get married in the UK

Please help! What else can I gather?

 

[wolanila]

I would just use every peice of evidence you have including signed letters from people who know your relationship. We sent I think 7 letters from our family and friends stating that they know us and that our relationship is genuine, the more letters you have from family and friends the b. Also you can use copies of flight tickets and stamps in your passports. You can show wedding gifts, cards, and letters you received. For your call history hi lighting the calls would be a nice touch. Your evidence looks good and full good luck. Oh and if your family and friends have ever chatted or called with your sweetheart or vice versa that is also good evidence.

 

[computergeek]

Actually, the narrative you wrote here is great. That you have SOME evidence many years back helps support your story.

The goal here isn't to overwhelm the VO with material - the goal here is to demonstrate to the VO that the relationship is genuine. You are sending in a SAMPLE, not a complete dump of information - if you get asked for more information, THEN you go for the information dump approach.

Letters from others certainly do help. E-mails when you have them help. The timeline you laid out here is great. The fact that you felt a deep sense of connection and fought through such odds actually works in your favour the way you present it.

You're telling a story and your story is compelling. The evidence you've described sounds good as well. Describing how you have thought about what you can do to be together in case the VO rejects your application also helps - it means you're already thinking about what you need to do in order to be together. It strengthens your case.

From what you've laid out, you will be fine. Maybe you get an interview, but honestly, it sounds like you spent 8 years getting to know each other very well indeed. Like a long courtship.

Good luck!

 

[Creampop]

I agree with computergeek, you are now married, they ask less of married couples. My husband and I met online in 1999 we didn't keep anything from before our first child was born (2003). We never even really spoke of either of us immigrating, heck we had another child 2 years after that and still it wasn't till our oldest was ready to start school that we even starting talking about it. All I had was pictures, no chat logs, no emails, no phone records my husband is deaf phone is usless to him, we did have a couple of plane tickets but we usually drove to see each other so not really any way to prove it other then our border crossings. Since your parents didn't/don't approve have them write a letter stating that. but you have quite abit more then I think you realize. All I sent in with my application was 20 pictures, 1 from every year we were together and 7 photo's from our wedding, our children's birth certificates because he had to sign as the father cus we were not married when they were born and his plane tickets corresponding with their births. only my mother and his mother attended our wedding.

 

[canadianwoman]

Please help! How do I prove my relationship is genuine considering we only met once and got married at the same time? Do you think I can get reference letters from friends that knew about our relationship?

Yes, good idea. Get letters from any relatives on either side that would be willing to write that they believe the marriage is genuine.

Should I gather a timeline (of course more detailed and better worded than the above) to show them how the relationship progressed? Should I write an essay on our relationship?

A timeline as you've written here (but more detailed) is good. An essay as well. Write the timeline together, if possible. Separate essays from each of you are fine.

Should I write about our future plans and what we have decided to do if for any reason his visa gets rejected?

Yes. Plans for the future, including what you would do if the visa is rejected, are good evidence that the relationship is genuine. Just include this info in your relationship essay. The more detailed your plans are about your future life together, the more it looks real. You can talk about where you will live, what jobs you and he will look for, your plans for children (or not - the key is that you have discussed this and agree). etc.

 

[noshi11]

I read some horror stories on this forum that freaked me out. Especially one similar to mine where he knew her from so many years and they were required to provide evidence from the beginning of the relationship which he didn't have.

Thank you Wolanila, computergeek, creampop and canadianwoman. All your suggestions and inputs are very helpful. I'll get started on the essay and timeline as soon as possible. Hopefully I can have everything ready by the end of this month.

Wolanila - What sort of letter do I get from family and friends? Do you have an example?

 

[wolanila]

noshi 11 Check your PM

 

[OhCanadiana]

Yes, good idea. Get letters from any relatives on either side that would be willing to write that they believe the marriage is genuine.

I agree, especially if you can get letters from your parents explaining their hesitation to allow you to meet and then why they changed their mind and also explaining whey they didn't attend your wedding. If they have ever spoken with your husband, they can share that too

 

[achander]

Here is a timeline:

March 2004: First year of university he added me on orkut (account no longer exists) and then after a couple of days on msn messanger.
2004: I told him I liked him and the feelings were mutual. We mostly chatted on msn (no record of this). Emails were exchanged but my main email account during that time got deactivated when I didn't use it for a while. I lost all the email data that was exchanged.
2005: progressed from msn to phone calls (I have record of phone calling cards bought online from 2007, but cannot find anything earlier than that since mostly I used calling cards bought from the store). Deactivated my orkut account.
2005-2006: We did not chat a lot. we mostly called each other and I used calling cards. I found a few emails exchanged between us but since mostly we talked over the phone it's just random forwarded emails etc. I found one email dated back to 2007 when we had a fight and he sent me an email response. We also started to webcam. Unfortunately I have no record of this either.
2007-2008: I finally had the courage to tell my parents. Since it was a long distance relationship I knew it was not going to go down too well. I know a lot of people didn't understand and thought it was ridiculous that we could be so serious when we never met in person. Even though we wanted to meet each other since 2004 we could not because I had to hide it from my parents and there was no way we could have met without them finding out. Even after my parents found out they would no way ever let me leave to go meet him.
2008 - 2012: Battle with parents continued for about 4 years. My relationship with him only got stronger with time and we knew for sure we wanted to get married. During this time he moved to UK to study for his masters degree. Completed his degree and currently is working there with a work permit status in UK. During this time we also switched from phone cards to skype, facetime etc.
Feb 2012: My parents finally agreed.
June 2012: My parents and his parents talked and my parents agreed to let us meet up with the condition that we get married the time we meet. Also, my parents didn't want anyone to know about our long distance relationship as this would be a disgrace to the family (in their point of view), so everything was kept a secret. My parents did not want to attend our wedding and his parents could not attend due to visa restrictions. We decided to meet up and have the wedding in UK. I booked my tickets for UK and my brother came along to attend the wedding.
Sepember 2012: We finally met each after more than 8 years of waiting. When we met, it felt like i knew him for as long as I could remember and it was no different than online/phone/facetime chats and video calls. In fact i felt like i fell in love with him all over again, but this time in person. The next day we got married. I remained in UK for 3 days and 4 nights in total. Again due to my parents restrictions I could not stay longer than that as they did not want anyone to find out about us. We did take a lot of pictures of the simple ceremony we had, dinner with his friends, bowling with his friends and him and I when we went sight seeing.

October 2012: I'm in the process of gathering evidence to prove our long distance relationship is genuine. Now I'm starting to stress out because I didn't keep record of our relationship as I should have. Knowing my parents, I never thought we would get to the point of actually getting married. We have been chatting or calling or video calling every single day from the past 8 years. The scale of evidence I gathered goes from very strong (Sept 2012) to Medium ( 2007 - 2011) to no evidence (2007-2004).

Please help! How do I prove my relationship is genuine considering we only met once and got married at the same time? Do you think I can get reference letters from friends that knew about our relationship? Should I gather a timeline (of course more detailed and better worded than the above) to show them how the relationship progressed? Should I write an essay on our relationship? Should I write about our future plans and what we have decided to do if for any reason his visa gets rejected?

This is what I have gathered so far:

facetime calls - almost ever single day from nov 2011
vibr calls - from 2011.
general emails - dated back to 2007
receipt of gift i bought him - 2011
I bought him an anti-virus software. I forwarded the key to him (lol) - 2010
facebook message sent to me from him - 2007
facebook chats - dated back to april 2011 (mostly online shopping links. we do a lot of online window shopping lol)
email exchanges on our birthdays
call log of him calling me at midnight on my birthday
he has pics of me dating back to 2004 (I don't know how we can prove that he has these from 2004)
Photos of our ceremony
greeting cards from his friends on our wedding day
skype video calls with his family after the wedding ceremony
email exchanged with the mosque that arranged the ceremony
receipt of our itinerary for the purpose of getting married
email replies between the photographer and I explaining our plans
receipt of the apartment we rented for 4 nights
copy of the marriage visit visa I obtained in order to get married in the UK

Please help! What else can I gather?

Any evidence you can put together is good. Since you are married now, it shouldn't be a big deal. I think you have a good amount of evidence already. Marriage certificate, pictures, flight details are all strong evidences. He can also provide details of his university while he was in Canada (if i read it right) this will show you guys met in university.

Good luck and I'm sure everything will work out. I did have a really funny question for u. After reading this entire post of yours, i came to a conclusion that you are Indian, is that right? The moment you mentioned "disgrace to family" i was like man, she has to be Indian
BTW I'm indian and thats why i get it

 

[noshi11]

Very close!