My Personal Connection to the Knapp's Relationship Model

My Relationship

    I have been with my current partner for nearly 10 years now. In November of this year, we will be celebrating our 10-year anniversary. We are not married, and this isn't a priority for us as of now. There is talk of marriage and small plans, however, we both agreed that we aren't financially ready for it since we already feel like were married in the first place. Our view of marriage isn't the traditional sense, since we just want to celebrate us, and enjoy ourselves. 

Knapps Model

    Using my relationship to connect to Knapp's Relationship Model, we are at the point in our relationship that we are probably the most committed deeply and have been for a long time now. We started referring to each other as partner, instead of girlfriend or boyfriend, because it shows our commitment to each other. Sometimes we do tell people that were married (In spirit anyways). I believe that our relationship in this regard is the 5th stage of Knapp's Model, and that we are in the Bonding stage. 

Online Communication

    When it comes to using online communication, I don't believe it has negatively affected my interpersonal relationship with my partner. We have quite a bit of fun using the social media such as Instagram. Without her I would probably have zero online presence in the online world. I think that online communication has been mainly beneficial. The benefits of it, from my point of view at least is that I get to send her food recipes, pictures, or funny videos that I think she would personally like. When it comes to texting or calling, we can communicate when apart and long distance were when we are on trips. The only downside is that sometimes we both doom scroll when were both bored. Especially in the Oregon winters, and there's nothing to do outside.

    I know most people see marriage as the final stage of a relationship, but I feel that investing your time and nurturing your relationship in all forms of communication is really the final stage. I like to think that Knapps Model provides evidence for this.