An Online Dating Fairytale

When I tell people how I met my boyfriend Ryan, I usually say that he wore me down. Indeed, that’s how our love story started. He was someone I had matched with on OKCupid, and he messaged me a lot. I started to get annoyed when I saw his messages in the morning. He wasn’t annoying, I was just annoyed at his insistence in getting to know me. I wasn’t particularly open to meeting new people and primarily viewed the platform as a way to waste time. I was off the heels of my first failed encounter at love via OKCupid (this round, anyway) and wasn’t feeling very optimistic about anyone who messaged me. I was about ready to pull the plug on the whole affair.

There was nothing wrong with him though, so I gave him a chance. He didn’t try to be anyone different than who he is. Said he worked as a medical transport driver. (Basically means he hauls around wheelchair patients all day.) In his bio he described himself as “just a t-shirt and jeans kind of guy.” I liked that. Very simple. Could this be the nice sane love I’d been looking for all these years? He was definitely cute in his Boston Red Sox hat. I wanted someone uncomplicated. They didn’t need to be an intellectual. They needed to be low-drama and stable enough to partner with.

I don’t remember what our match percentage was — high 70s or low 80s, I want to say — but apparently it doesn’t matter much since I learned that he changed his answers to be closer to mine. I found that endearing when he told me recently. We wouldn’t have matched if our answers weren’t at least somewhat compatible to begin with though, I don’t think.

I’m glad I never made him take the Myers-Briggs personality test before I met him. If I’d known his type — total opposite of me, ESTJ — I’d probably have passed on meeting him. I’m that unreasonable and dismissive. As an intuitive (INFP) I found it hard to believe I could find any long-term happiness with…a sensor. Don’t they just think differently than intuitives do? The positive experience I was having with Ryan was teaching me a lot about the bullshit of personality tests.

I am still trying to figure out what our key to getting along is. He makes me laugh, that might be #1. When I get upset — which isn’t often these days — he knows how to defuse the situation, mostly. Sometimes he still says things that trigger me, like “calm down.” But I forgive him, because what else do you say when your girlfriend is freaking out? I just find it angering and it makes me even more upset than before. He said he’s learned to just step aside and let me have my minute of freaking out, knowing that it will pass. And it always does. I think that’s honestly the best approach anyone can take with me.

He helps me stay calm by putting my problems into perspective. Anxiety has a way of magnifying all your problems. I get caught up in that endless thought loop. He listens patiently and offers a voice of reason that tells me everything is going to work out okay, and that I’ve got this. When he tells me those things, I somehow believe it.

I’m so in love. He’s exactly the loving, supportive partner I’ve been dreaming of. And to think it was the evil of online dating that brought him to me. A treasure among the trash. So, so thankful.

I suppose it doesn’t matter where you meet your love, it’s just funny that I had to meet mine in a place I’ve done so much shit-talking about. I was beginning to lose faith that a non-vapid relationship could be formed on such platforms. Something more than friends with benefits…something real…something more than love’s waiting room.

I talked with him in text for about a week before I met him in person. He won me over by making our initial encounter very low-key. It was impossible to say no to. I just went over to his house and we hung out and he kissed me at the end of the night. It was really nice. I didn’t have to be uncomfortable in some obnoxious social setting all night — I was able to just focus on him and relax. He tried hard to bring me out of my shell, I will give him that. I recall being reserved that first night. I am still a little shy sometimes, what can I say.

He told me he loved me around the three-month mark, my birthday 2018. He did it in the most romantic way, too. He gave me a Build-A-Bear for my birthday and told me to press the hand. The bear said “Happy birthday, Nicole…I love you” recorded in his voice. I kissed him and told him I loved him, too. Definitely one of the most romantic things anyone has done for me. I find out later that he apparently tried very hard to get me to say I loved him first. Ha! As if that were happening. Put myself out there?! Nope, not doing that.

I think the way a man is with his pets also says a lot about him, and he definitely treats Charlotte like his precious little baby. He’s very affectionate with her. He also buys her good-quality food to be sure she stays nice and healthy. I know Ryan already has a stepdaughter, so being a father is not new to him, but I can see the many ways in which he’d make a great father and it’s very heart-warming to see. I feel like this is someone I could make a life with.

It’s only a little over eight months in, but at this point I can’t imagine my life without him. He’s too special to me. He’s my shelter on a rainy day. I want him with me as I go through this thing called life. I just went nearly two weeks without seeing him, and it was absolute torture. When I saw him again after all that time, for a moment he looked like a stranger. It was like I was seeing him for the first time, all over again. His is a face I never, ever want to forget.