OTTAWA - Couples in long-distance relationships say the soaring price of gas is breaking their hearts as well as their wallets.
With prices at the pump reaching all-time highs, travelling is becoming too expensive for love-struck couples living in separate cities.
Stephane Boisvert knows well the price of long-distance love.
He and his girlfriend Marie-Eve Marcotte met in January when he was living in Montreal. A few months later the couple decided to maintain their relationship after he moved to Ottawa.
Now they take turns travelling to each other's city on weekends, and Boisvert says the financial burden is taking its toll.
"I mean now it's $1.35 per litre up from $1 litre when we started dating, so really it's an extra $60 a month approximately. The price of a night out or two.''
And it's about to get worse.
Starting in July, Boisvert will have to travel the extra 270 kilometres to Quebec City to visit Marie-Eve, where she'll be living for the next five years.
The two have decided the added distance is just too much of a pounding on the wallets and have chosen instead to see each other less often.
"Since she is moving to Quebec City, it's definitely not going to be every week anymore. I mean you can't support that.''
High gas prices are taking an emotional toll on these couples who are already working hard to keep the spark alive, says Marilyn Belleghem, a registered marriage and family therapist in Burlington, Ont.
"It brings up other problems, especially in cash-strapped couples,'' she says, adding that absence does not always make the heart grow fonder.
"If you're not seeing each other as often then that absence doesn't mean that while we are separated we are just pining for each other. Because, very often, with that distance that's when another distraction comes along.''
Erin Joy knows first-hand the rising cost of living apart from the man she's engaged to.
Joy's fiance Kyle Hendershot lives in Ottawa, but for two years the 25-year-old graduate student has been 175 kilometres away at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.
"My gas was around $35 a trip and now, just for gas, it's at least $50.''
With a wedding in October and student loans to repay, Joy says her trips to Ottawa have decreased to once a month and the money to travel is coming out of her savings.
"I have extra just-in-case (money) and I have used a lot more of that. . . . It's pretty much coming out of savings or debt, however you want to look at it.''
Both couples say they have managed the burden this far, but relationship expert Belleghem warns some may not be so lucky.
"You just have to wonder: At what point does it just not become feasible?''
Couples living even farther apart are also facing increased financial burdens. The price of airplane tickets increased last month after Air Canada introduced its new fuel surcharges, adding up to $60 on all one-way flights within Canada and the United States.
