Psychologist Pascal Anger explains how a couple can resist estrangement and transform absence into connection.
When love meets distance
Their story has often been told like a novel: that of a president and a singer who fell in love over dinner, one evening in 2007, at Jacques Séguéla’s house. Since then, Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni seemed to live in a bubble of tenderness, inseparable, accomplices even in the street.
But this time, the couple will have to face a void. From tomorrow, the former head of state must be incarcerated in the Paris prison center – La Santé. Five years of possible separation, an ordeal that already worries the former First Lady. According to our colleagues, she fears in particular that her husband will not “feed” properly once locked up.
Beyond the shock, this forced distance raises a question that many couples know: how to stay connected when everything separates? For Pascal Anger, psychologist and author of the book The couple and the other (Éditions L’Harmattan), it is in the very nature of the romantic bond that the answer lies.
Commitment stronger than distance
According to him, the case of the presidential couple is that of a bond that life puts to the test.
“It may therefore be interesting here to think about the notion of distance in a relationship: is it a question of physical proximity? Or romantic commitment? Either way, each person’s feelings, as well as the length of time apart, play a key role“, he explains.
For those who stay outside, lack becomes a daily companion, sometimes heavy to bear. However, certain strategies make it possible to preserve the flame.
“Regular communication – via text, phone, letters, even virtual messages – can help stay in touch and maintain the connection“, explains the psychologist.
It is not so much the physical presence that nourishes a couple, he emphasizes, “but the emotional connection“. And paradoxically, this separation can sometimes revive desire: “Reunions are often all the stronger“.
Pascal Anger also reminds us that this way of life is not new: “We can also observe this lifestyle among truck drivers or fishermen: they are used to living and working far from their families. Everyone retains their freedom. The most difficult thing often ultimately remains the return to “normal” life.“.
The return home, an ordeal in its own right
After a long absence, the couple must find balance. Habits change, rhythms shift, benchmarks become blurred.
“You have to reorganize your life, find your bearings and ensure that the other does not become a daily obsession. But the final rapprochement can be very rewarding“, observes the specialist.
It’s a learning process, a slow but fruitful reconstruction. Because to love from a distance, he says, is to invent a new way of being together:
“It’s another way of experiencing love. The important thing is that both partners benefit from it. The Sarkozys, for example, did not choose this situation; they will have to invent a new way of being together“.