Princess Kate and Prince William had an exceedingly eventful weekend as the pair attended the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games in Scotland with their three children—Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and Prince Louis. From springing into "dad mode" to executing damage control, Prince William appeared to be on high alert throughout the event. But according to royal fans, the Prince of Wales was never far away from his wife.

One X user highlighted Prince William's seeming adoration of Princess Kate by sharing two photos. In the first snap, Princess Charlotte, Prince Louis, and Prince George sit between Kate and William. In the second, the children have moved, leaving Princess Kate and Prince William to sit next to one another. The royal fan captioned the post, "How it started v. how it ended...Oh William."

Another commenter suggested that William was a "smart man" for moving closer to his wife. Meanwhile, someone else shared, "They can't live without each other."

According to the Express, another royal fan expressed excitement regarding Kate and William's appearance at the Commonwealth Games, writing, "Prince William wanted to sit next to Princess Catherine!! So sweet. The bond they have with each other and their children is amazing! I love it!"

After navigating some complicated family dynamics, it appears as though Kate and William always come back to one another.

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Once her divorce was finalized, Princess Diana became one of the most eligible people in the world. According to the princess's former royal butler, the royal was romantically pursued by an award-winning Hollywood actor, who lost some confidence after being turned down by Diana.

In his book A Royal Duty, former royal butler Paul Burrell recalled, "One Oscar-winning Hollywood actor's confident image suddenly disappeared when it proved he was too shy to ring the palace himself and ask the princess for a date: he got a friend to write a letter on his behalf."

Unfortunately for the unnamed actor, Princess Diana wasn't interested in dating him.

"When the princess wrote back, politely refusing, he returned with another request a month later," Burrell shared. "She had a drink with him and chose never to meet him again."

Of course, this particular actor wasn't alone in propositioning Princess Diana following her divorce, according to the former butler. "He wasn't the only one with honorable intentions," Burrell said.

Burrell recounted just some of the other men who attempted to date Diana after her split from King Charles.

"There was a sporting legend, who made a living out of racing in a field of competitors; a leading musician; a novelist; a lawyer; an entrepreneur; a billionaire who ran his own empire, and one extremely famous politician," the former butler noted.

He continued, "The unfortunate thing was that while they might have provided the princess with enthralling company, her heart lay elsewhere."

Ultimately, Princess Diana reportedly turned down the majority of men who tried to date her, but that didn't stop the invitations from arriving.

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Prince William and Princess Kate have been happily married since April 29, 2011, but the couple encountered some issues early in their relationship. While William was initially "concerned" Kate would be "overawed" by his royal lifestyle, the Princess of Wales allegedly got "spooked" by one element of the romance.

In the new book, William and Catherine: The Monarchy's New Era: The Inside Story, royal expert Russell Myers shared, "Having grown up under the media glare his entire life, William was clearly aware of what lay on the horizon. For Catherine, however, it was entirely new territory."

Myers continued, "William had done his best to inform her about how the media operated, but now she was the subject of their pursuit things felt incredibly different."

Describing the Princess of Wales's reaction, a former royal courtier told Myers, "She was spooked by the attention." They continued, "No matter how much you're told about what can happen, you literally can't have any idea about it until you're on the other side, and now she was very much on the other side."

Unsurprisingly, interest in the couple's relationship continued to grow, which must have felt quite overwhelming at times. "William and Catherine found themselves at the centre of a media storm," Myers explained.

Defending the media's interest in William's romance, a former editor told Myers, "The world had been waiting for the news that William had a proper love interest and once it was all but confirmed by him or the palace, it marked a turning point for sure."

They continued, "The public were desperate to know if the future King had found his Queen and what that would mean for the future of the monarchy in an ever-changing world."

In 2026, Kate and William appear united in their confidence as a unit, and the world is seemingly ready for their future tenure on the throne. Still, dealing with such a huge amount of pressure early in their relationship can't have been easy.

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor is experiencing some major changes in 2026. Following renewed interest in his association with disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, the former Duke of York gave up all of his royal titles. He is also set to leave his home, Royal Lodge in Windsor, for a more discreet property in Sandringham. And according to some sources, the ex-prince might be ready to start dating again.

Andrew's ex-wife, Sarah Ferguson, will also be leaving Royal Lodge, having previously maintained a close relationship with her former spouse. As reported by Closer, "Having previously called Andrew...her 'soulmate' despite their divorce...the intentions of her...ex-husband have prompted Sarah to finally cut ties."

"It's like having the golden handcuffs taken off, or at least that's how she’s trying to spin it," a source told the outlet. "Now that she's no longer hitching her wagon to Andrew it's opened up a lot of choices to her, or at least she's convinced it has."

According to the publication, Sarah's alleged decision to look for romance has given Andrew the "green light" to pursue dating, too.

One source claimed, "He's even talking about how he wants to get back to dating." However, the outlet noted that the prospect of Andrew dating has the Royal Family "bracing themselves for yet more humiliation in the months ahead."

Speaking to Closer, one source explained, "The royals will be relieved to see him go, but they'll also be worrying about what he might get up to once he's off and operating completely on his own terms." The source continued, "Instead of lying low and accepting some consequences like they'd hoped, he's doubling down on the same arrogance that landed him here in the first place."

As for Sarah's alleged romance journey, one source told Closer, "She says there's no reason she can't throw herself back into the dating game and land a rich man to make the rest of her days a whole lot easier." They continued, "She's always had a certain charm that attracts powerful and wealthy men and in her view she's not lost that."

Royal fans have been intrigued by Princess Kate and Prince William's relationship from the very start. The couple's fairytale royal wedding on April 29, 2011 only cemented the world's love affair with their romance. And according to a royal expert, the Prince and Princess of Wales's relationship is completely different "when the cameras drop."

According to the Mirror, royal expert and biographer Katie Nicholl remarked, "They tend to do things in a low-key way, but it wouldn't surprise me to see them do something special to recognize 15 years of marriage [in 2026]."

Nicholl continued, "They've been through so much and, of course, each year Kate clocks up will be another year of being cancer-free, which really will be worth marking."

Furthermore, the royal commentator opened up about what Kate and William are like when the world isn't watching. Nicholl told the outlet, "I've been with them on many occasions, and when the cameras drop, you'll often see them walk away and Kate will put an arm around his waist, or he'll place his hand in the small of her back."

Basically, the Prince and Princess of Wales generally keep overt signs of their romance fairly private.

Nicholl also noted, "There's a lovely closeness between them, and whereas at the start of their marriage they seemed shy about being affectionate in public, they're so much more confident now."

Noting that Kate and William have been a couple for a long time, Nicholl told the outlet, "They've been together for nearly a quarter of a century. Of course there are going to be hiccups."

Regardless of the obstacles they might face in the future, the royal expert believes that Kate and William's relationship will continue to thrive. "They're a team and that's how they work," she said.

A plethora of royal love stories have made it to the big screen, from The Prince and Me to Red, White, and Royal Blue. Now, a real-life prince has found himself at the center of a regal Hollywood romance, after being photographed kissing a famous actress.

Prince Constantine-Alexios is the dashing royal protagonist in this story, and the alleged object of his affection is none other than Outer Banks star Madelyn Cline. According to Hello! magazine, Cline has been hanging out with Contantine-Alexios in New York, where his parents—Crown Prince Pavlos and Crown Princess Marie-Chantal—have a home.

Per the outlet, Constantine-Alexios and the I Know What You Did Last Summer star were photographed kissing, with the snap gaining traction on social media. "The pair were previously spotted dining together in Manhattan, while a video showed them holding hands as they walked down a street," the publication noted.

Constantine-Alexios grew up in London, before relocating to the United States to attend Georgetown University; he graduated in 2022, Us Weekly reported. Since then, the royal has worked as a model for Dior, and as a painter and sculptor. He is also Prince William's godson, giving him an important connection to the British Royal Family.

During an interview with Remix Magazine in March 2023, Cline dished on how she knows she's in love with someone. "The initial signs are obviously that giddiness and the butterflies," the actress explained. "But even after that, there's even deeper feelings where I feel completely at ease and comfortable and so full of love."

Cline continued, "I especially know that I'm in love when I feel that they know me better than anyone and they're my best friend. And even if you're infuriated with them you just love them so much. It's so complex."

Sightings of Zendaya and fiancé Tom Holland are pretty rare, which makes their joint attendance at a gala low-key exciting. Plus, the Euphoria star used the opportunity to showcase the ideal LBD for the cooler weather September has brought to London.

On Saturday, Sept. 20, Zendaya joined her Spider-Man: No Way Home co-star at The Brother's Trust Gala for "The Tom Holland Posh Pub Quiz." The Brother's Trust is a charitable foundation started by Holland's parents, Dominic and Nikki Holland, with the aim of helping "charities who struggle to be heard in the noisy not-for-profit sector" with the help of "Tom's reach and popularity."

In photos shared by Java Joy founder Laura Hope Whitaker, Zendaya could be seen wearing a little black dress featuring long sleeves and a structural cape extending from the collar. The sleek mini dress is taken from the 2022 Valentino Pink PP Collection, and was styled with pants on the runway.

The actress accessorized her outfit with sheer tights, black pointed-toe heels, and a Bulgari Tubogas Bracelet, which retails for $9,100.

Whitaker captioned her Instagram post, "We showed up in our best—with joy—and it carried through the night." She continued, "We hugged, we chatted, we sang [and] we tried (and lost) the pub quiz. But we got autographed spoons so I think we really won!" Referencing the famous couple, Whitaker wrote, "We chatted with Tom, his family and met Zendaya."

While Zendaya and Holland have managed to keep their relationship relatively private, they occasionally discuss their sweet romance in interviews. For instance, during an appearance on U.K. podcast Dish in late 2024, Holland called Zendaya "the best thing that's ever happened to me."

On working with his future wife, Holland shared, "It's just that perfect thing when you're on set and a director will give you a note that maybe you don't agree with, or I know that she doesn't particularly like, and it's just that, like, familiar glance at each other of like, can't wait to talk about that later."

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It looks like Zoë Kravitz has well and truly moved on following her split from fiancé Channing Tatum. According to multiple sources, the Big Little Lies actress has been hanging out with Harry Styles, and they've been spotted in more than one country together. While it's currently unclear just how serious Kravitz and Styles might be, fans likely weren't predicting the pair to be 2025's next big celebrity couple.

On Monday, August 25, celebrity gossip Instagram account Deuxmoi re-shared footage of Kravitz and Styles in Rome, where they could be seen walking through the streets arm in arm.

An anonymous source also told the outlet, "Zoë Kravitz and Harry Styles making out in Rita's in London after her premiere." Kravitz, of course, has been promoting her new movie, Caught Stealing, alongside her co-star, Austin Butler, and Styles was apparently present for the film's London premiere on August 19.

A source seemingly confirmed that Kravitz and Styles are dating, telling People, "He's been spending time with her while she's been on her press run." It's entirely possible the "Watermelon" singer and the Blink Twice director are keeping their relationship casual, or that they're simply just friends. But one thing is clear—fans will be eagerly awaiting confirmation either way.

In February 2025, Kravitz spoke about her split from Tatum during the press tour for her directorial debut, Blink Twice. "I love this thing that we made together, and I care for him very much," she told Elle. "Even when you bring up how great his performance is, it warms my heart to hear that, and I'm so happy that all of it happened. I just feel so grateful that we got to go on that journey together."

Gigi Hadid and Bradley Cooper have been dating for quite some time, and the famous couple has even started traveling together. This week, the model and her Oscar-nominated boyfriend were spotted arriving at JFK Airport in New York, and Hadid managed to curate the perfect outfit for the occasion, which included celeb-beloved loafers and faded wide-leg jeans.

There's perhaps nothing worse than being uncomfortable on a long-haul flight, and Hadid's travel style managed to be both chic and functional. A pair of faded and ripped wide-leg jeans, with rolled-up cuffs at the ankles, were the ideal item to build her outfit around. The Guest in Residence founder also wore a simple white T-shirt and a candy pink cardigan.

The Victoria's Secret model accessorized her airport outfit with a pair of brown loafers—sure to become even more popular as fall approaches—which she styled with preppy white socks.

Cooper's outfit was a little more incognito compared to his girlfriend's, as the actor paired a black hoodie with khaki pants and a black baseball cap.

Multiple celebrities have been transitioning their style from summer to fall, with loafers regularly featuring in their outfits. Dakota Johnson recently swapped her ballet flats for her vintage Gucci loafers, while Emma Stone has been wearing her loafers since spring.

Hadid further accessorized her look with a Liffner Pillow Hobo Suede Dark Brown Bag, which retails for $695, a selection of gold necklaces, and a pair of rimless oval sunglasses.

Just last month, Page Six suggested that Cooper and Hadid are ready to settle down together. A source told the outlet that they're "incredibly happy and are in their own bubble." One thing is certain: they've nailed their airport style as a couple.

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Kylie Jenner and Timothée Chalamet's relationship became very public throughout awards season 2025, with the Khy founder supporting her Oscar-nominated boyfriend at multiple events. However, according to a new report, Chalamet and Jenner haven't been able to spend much time together this summer on account of their busy schedules.

Rather than breaking up, Jenner and Chalamet are reportedly "making it work," and striving to ensure their long-distance relationship is a success. A source told People, "They haven't seen each other for a few weeks only because Timothée's been filming Dune in a studio in Budapest, and Kylie's been working too...She visited him in July."

The source elaborated, "But even though Kylie has a private jet, the flight is still 12 hours...She's a mom and she works as well. She has a lot of responsibilities." According to the source, Chalamet faces a "grueling" filming schedule while he's working, "with very little downtime" to entertain his girlfriend.

In spite of the distance between them, Jenner and Chalamet are "making it work," per People's source. "They FaceTime most days. They miss each other and are totally fine."

In July, the celeb couple spent a few days together in France, before Chalamet's Dune schedule ramped up. At the time, a source told People, "Kylie was really excited when he arrived in France." The source continued, "They only have a few days together before he starts filming in Prague...But they're used to this kind of schedule."

The magazine's source also suggested that the Kylie Cosmetics founder "will fly to see [Chalamet] when she can," showing just how committed she is to the relationship. As for the award-winning actor's priorities, the insider said he faced "a long, demanding shoot that will take [him] all over the world."

Hailey Bieber has proven, once again, that she's an expert when it comes to styling the little black dress. On Friday, August 8, the Rhode founder was photographed grabbing dinner at Italian restaurant Giorgio Baldi alongside husband Justin Bieber, with the pair coordinating their sleek black outfits.

Notably, Hailey opted for a vintage Gucci by Tom Ford mini dress from the fashion house's spring 2003 collection. Made from raw ribbon material and featuring a plunging neckline, the little black dress recently sold on a re-sale site for $4,495.

This isn't the first time that Hailey—who is styled by Dani Michelle—has worn vintage Gucci. Back in April, the makeup mogul styled an icy blue vintage Gucci dress, from the Spring 1998 collection, also designed by Tom Ford.

Hailey's husband Justin kept his outfit casual, wearing an oversize black leather jacket, which was perfectly in keeping with his wife's all-black look. A blue hoodie, an oversize pair of faded jeans, and brown work boots completed the singer's date night outfit.

Meanwhile, the Rhode Beauty founder accessorized her LBD with a vintage Gucci top handle bag, and a pair of Saint Laurent slingback pumps in glazed black leather.

The Gucci by Tom Ford mini dress acquired by Hailey and her stylist was originally seen on the runway in Milan in September 28, 2002. The striking mini dress formed part of Gucci's Spring 2003 RTW collection, and it's easy to see why Hailey wanted to add the piece to her closet.

While Hailey's exact Gucci by Tom Ford mini dress is difficult to track down, similar styles are available from alternate designers.

Pamela Anderson's renaissance continues, this time with the release of 2025's The Naked Gun reboot, in which she stars opposite action heartthrob Liam Neeson. The press tour for the comedy has been surprisingly heartfelt, with a bubbly chemistry emitting from all of Neeson and Anderson's interactions with one another. And according to a source, their connection quickly developed when they began shooting The Naked Gun.

Speaking to Us Weekly, a source claimed, "[Neeson] has been intrigued and smitten [with Anderson] since they started filming and expressed this to her." The 73-year-old Taken actor "is quiet and introspective," the source said, and "Pamela brings this fun curiosity that he really enjoys."

As for why a romantic relationship between the two performers might work out, the source alleged, "Pam and Liam are a good match because they have similar personalities and understand each other."

The source continued, telling the outlet that Anderson and Neeson "balance each other really well."

Us Weekly confirmed on July 29 that the two Naked Gun stars were officially dating. Discussing the burgeoning relationship, a source told the publication that Neeson and Anderson "always had chemistry while they were filming and their friendship naturally developed into more."

The outlet's source also noted that the 58-year-old actress and her actor beau were "learning how to navigate" their newfound romance together. "They are both shy and have tried to stay private but the spark between them is obvious," the insider said.

In October 2024, romance rumors started when Neeson and Anderson spoke to People magazine. "With Pamela, first off, I'm madly in love with her," Neeson told the outlet. "She's just terrific to work with." He continued, "I can't compliment her enough, I'll be honest with you. No huge ego. She just comes in to do the work. She's funny and so easy to work with. She's going to be terrific in the film."

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's love story has been well-documented, with the pair tying the knot in a fairytale royal wedding on May 19, 2018. Since then, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have moved to California and grown their family, welcoming son Prince Archie in May 2019 and daughter Princess Lilibet in June 2021. And on July 4, the Sussex clan celebrated in a special way in honor of Harry and Meghan's second ever date in 2016.

"Our second date was the 4th of July 2016 and H brought me cupcakes to celebrate," Duchess Meghan captioned an Instagram post. "Now, all these years later, our two children are in on the tradition." Photos in the carousel revealed a selfie Meghan and Harry took on their second date, as well as one of the cupcakes the Duke of Sussex gifted his future wife.

"Happy Independence Day!" Meghan wrote. "May your day be as sweet as these cupcakes." In another photo, a plate of cupcakes appeared to be held by one of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex's children, showing how the family tradition is being continued.

Prince Harry previously opened up about the significance of July 4 in his relationship with Meghan. After arriving late for their first date on July 3, the Duke of Sussex pulled out all the stops the following night by purchasing gifts for the former Suits star. Writing in his memoir Spare, Harry revealed (via People), "She walked in, wearing a pretty blue sundress with white pinstripes. She was aglow. I stood and said: I bear gifts. A pink box. I held it forward. She shook it. What's this?"

Recalling the important evening, Harry explained, "She opened the box. Cupcakes. Red, white, and blue cupcakes, to be exact. In honor of Independence Day." He continued, "I said something about the Brits having a very different view of Independence Day from the Yanks, but, oh, well."

Royal fans were delighted by Kate Middleton's appearance at Trooping the Colour on June 14. The Princess of Wales paid tribute to Queen Elizabeth II with a special pair of earrings, and royal experts suggested King Charles views Princess Kate as a "huge asset" within the Royal Family. Now, two experts have weighed in on the Prince and Princess of Wales's chemistry at The King's birthday parade, as well as Princess Kate's return to form.

Speaking on behalf of Slingo, Grant Harrold, a former royal butler who worked for King Charles, said, "Kate looked amazing, she took it in her stride and did everyone proud. She looked radiant and back where she should be—at the forefront of the Royal Family."

Harrold continued, "Everyone's eyes were on William and Kate. They are the future of the monarchy, the future King and Queen. They were very confident. It was lovely to see a very modern approach to the Royal Family and Trooping the Colour."

Meanwhile, Dr. Arthur Cassidy, a chartered member of the British Psychological Society, told Hello! magazine that Kate and William provided an "authentic masterclass" in subtle PDA. "Prince William...devoted father and protector...shows for a few milliseconds, a tight upper lip as he faces Princess Kate," Dr. Cassidy told the outlet. "This signifies his positive emotional state as he's deeply in love with wife Kate."

According to Dr. Cassidy, William's body language showed he's "physically attracted" to his wife, and "this produces an intense inner emotional reaction to Princess Catherine's long-lasting loving gaze. His lips then become more relaxed."

As for Princess Kate's response, Dr. Cassidy said in their analysis, "[She was] glowing with positive emotions and energy expressed in her toned body posture and facial characteristics."

Tracee Ellis Ross has had a dextrous life and career to date, but that doesn't mean she's totally without regrets. Like any woman, Ross has made difficult choices, some of which involved her romantic life and whether she'd start a family. In a new interview on Michelle Obama's IMO podcast, Ross got candid about "grieving" certain aspects of life she didn't experience, and revealed why she prefers dating younger men.

During her appearance on IMO With Michelle Obama and Craig Robinson, the 52-year-old Blackish actress explained (via People), "A lot of men my age are steeped in a toxic masculinity and have been raised in a culture where there is a particular way that a relationship looks." She continued, "Anything that starts to smell of that for me—I did enough of it where I was controlled and felt like I was a possession or a prize—I just have no interest in it. And I will not do it again."

Ross also praised what she perceived to be an "openness" in younger men, saying, "I have long been past the age where I feel like it's my job to teach somebody or grow them up. That, I'm not interested in."

The Black Mirror star noted that, despite loving her life, she also "grieved" certain milestones she didn't reach—something many people contend with as they age. "I grieve the things that I thought would be and that are not," Ross said during her podcast appearance. "I'm not married. I don't have children, and I think I grieve that at times."

However, Ross refuses to settle, especially when it comes to romantic relationships. "As much grief does surface for me around not having children and not having a partner, I still wouldn't want the wrong partner," she noted. "I'm not interested in that."

As for what she is looking for in a romantic relationship, Ross told the hosts, "You have to make my life better. It can't just be, 'I'm in a relationship to be in a relationship.' So even though the grief does emerge and that comes and I hold that, I think of what I've done." She continued, "I wake up every morning trying to do my best. I didn't wake up one morning and be like, 'I'm going to mess this day up.' So I must be where I'm supposed to be."

Olivia Munn and John Mulaney recently welcomed their second child together. However, when Munn became pregnant with their first baby, she wasn't in an established relationship with the comedian.

In a GQ profile of Mulaney, Munn shared that her pregnancy came as somewhat of a shock to them both, as they weren't actually in a relationship at the time. "It wasn't anything close to 'dating,'" Munn explained. "I barely knew him."

According to the profile, Munn and Mulaney first met at a wedding in 2013, but it wasn't until early 2021 that they reconnected. Munn reportedly helped Mulaney find an apartment in New York after he left rehab, and that's how their romance started.

"The ensuing relationship, such as it was, was brief," GQ reported. "If the tabloids thought they had a scoop about them dating, the joke was on them, because it was never true: They were just having a baby."

Munn revealed to GQ that Mulaney was excited to have a baby with her, regardless of whether they were in a romantic relationship. She told the outlet, "It wasn't necessarily 'We're going to be married and live together' or any of that, but it was 'I will be involved in some way.'"

Munn and Mulaney didn't live together for most of the actress' pregnancy. As a result, Munn assumed they would likely coparent the baby, without being a couple. As Mulaney had only recently completed a stay in a rehab facility, Munn was unsure how to support the comedian.

"It was like watching a man in a tsunami," Munn explained. "I was watching someone newly sober, at the edge of a cliff, and I didn't know him well enough to help him."

While navigating a tumultuous period in their lives, Mulaney was reportedly delighted about the forthcoming birth of his first child. "That's the one thing that made him seem light and happy," Munn revealed. "I remember he was really excited to tell his parents."

Earlier this year, Munn announced the birth of her second child with Mulaney on Instagram. "Méi June Mulaney came into the world September 14, 2024, the year of the dragon," she captioned the post.

The actress continued, "I had so many profound emotions about not being able to carry my daughter. When I first met our gestational surrogate we spoke mother to mother. She showed me so much grace and understanding, I knew I had found a real-life angel."

In the season 6, episode “Pick-a-Little, Talk-a-Little” of Sex and the City Carrie, Charlotte, Samantha, and Miranda do something they rarely consider: seek dating advice from a man. When no-fuss Miranda can't comprehend why the man she went on a promising date with wasn't calling her, Carrie's boyfriend Berger spells it out. "He's just not that into you,” he says. Miranda’s relieved to hear something so simple—liberated from weeks of hand-wringing by the phone—while her cosmopolitan-sipping friends are flummoxed. The sentiment quickly reverberated across America's single women.

The revelation on the 2003 episode was the brainchild of Liz Tuccillo and Greg Behrendt, who were writers on the hit HBO show. The two stumbled onto the concept in the writers’ room when a colleague was asking for advice on why she hadn’t heard from a recent date. The show’s resident cisgender, straight male writer, Behrendt, said the now iconic line—leading to shockwaves and debate among their coworkers, and ultimately the creation of the SATC bit. It eventually inspired him and Tuccillo to write He’s Just Not That Into You, the 2004 no-bullshit dating manual that sparked a revolution of boundaries and breakups.

This September 1 marks two decades since He’s Just Not That Into You hit shelves and shook up the dating world, examining love from a straight man and woman’s perspective. In the book, Behrendt responds to questions in an uncompromising, yet supportive tone, reminding the reader of their worth; Tuccillo chimes in on why it’s difficult to accept the truth or let go of a lackluster relationship. Each chapter ends with a worksheet for readers to apply these lessons to their lives.

Their advice felt groundbreaking, though Tuccillo admits to Marie Claire in a recent interview that “it’s not rocket science.” With the book’s messaging, encouraging resilience and self-compassion, its concepts stormed conversations between girlfriends and ignited cultural combustion, resulting in an Oprah Winfrey approval stamp, a Gilmore Girls reference, a follow-up published in 2006, and even a 2009 feature film of the same name starring every heartthrob of the era (Scarlett Johansson! Drew Berrymore! Jennifer Aniston! Bradley Cooper!).

But back in 2004 when He's Just Not That Into You came out, straight women were still mostly waiting by landlines. Now, dating couldn't look more different, from the dawn of social media and dating apps to the pool being flooded by more accomplished women than ever struggling to find men who meet their expectations. But even still, many have the same gripes as those who once read Behrendt and Tuccillo's treatise—just look at the viral TikTok trend of teary-eyed women complaining about bad first dates, lack of communication, ghosting, breadcrumbing, love bombing, or how hard it is to meet someone IRL.

In honor of He’s Just Not That Into You turning 20, Marie Claire spoke to Tuccillo and Behrendt about the book’s legacy, what they would change if they were drafting the book today, how to endure rejection, and if they think dating apps have (and haven’t) changed bad dating etiquette.

Marie Claire: A pivotal moment in the Sex and the City writers’ room led to the creation of He’s Just Not That Into You. What happened and why did it feel so important?

Liz Tuccillo: There was a woman in the writer's room talking about a guy who wasn't calling her back when he promised that he would—she just never heard from him. There were all women in the room except for [showrunner] Michael Patrick King and Greg Behrendt, who was the only straight man. We’re just saying things like, ‘Oh, he might be intimidated,’ ‘He has mother issues,’ ‘He is getting over his ex-girlfriend,’ and excuses of why he didn't call. And Greg just went, ‘Yeah, no, I think he's just not that into you.’

We were so shocked that anyone said something like that. Then we started peppering Greg with questions. He just started batting all our excuses away. We were all so blown away as if it was the newest, groundbreaking idea that basically if a guy doesn't call you, he doesn't like you.It seems so obvious, but it felt so groundbreaking that at the end of it, I was like, Oh, I feel like this is a book.

Greg Behrendt: My thought process was, ‘You're missing the bigger point here. You're talking around this problem.’ Because they were friends and because we were all being honest, I'm like, ‘I've done this. He doesn't like you. He's just not that into you. I've done what you're talking about more than once and so have my friends. And it's not even about you really. This is what somebody is doing when they're blowing you off slowly and cowardly.’

MC: Twenty years later, what are your reflections on the book’s cultural impact?

Tuccillo: I'm proud we wrote something that ended up becoming part of the zeitgeist for a while. My reflection is that it happened to be an idea whose time had come. There were lots and lots of women making excuses for being in bad relationships or situations, and people were ready to hear it on some level.

You write a lot of things, but rarely do you write something and somebody will come up to you about it still years later. Every once in a while, somebody will say, ‘Your book helped me get out of a bad relationship and because of it, I met my husband.’ And that's like, Wow. I can write a lot of TV shows, but no one's going to say that.

Behrendt: When [Liz brought] the idea of the book up, I was like, ‘I don't think so.’ I was uncomfortable with it actually because I thought, ‘These women don't need my help.’ I feel that way about my wife. She doesn't usually need my suggestions. But Liz was adamant that this was a message that she thought would [resonate] with people. And then I even told my wife about it and my wife agreed. And so, I was like, ‘All right. But we have to be very careful about how we do this.’Originally Liz was like, ‘It needs to be you [to write the book].’ And I said, ‘It has to be us. There has to be a woman's voice in this.’ Liz was confident that something would happen with it, and I was like, ‘I just want to get it into Urban Outfitters.’

MC: Were there any unexpected surprises that came with the book's popularity?

Tuccillo: Our first interview for the book [was] on The Oprah Winfrey Show—for an hour. When our publicist called, I remember she was in the parking lot and screamed out, ‘Oprah wants you!’ She dedicated the entire episode to the book. And then for her to raise the book up in the air on her show and say, ‘Every woman in America needs to buy this,’ I mean, you don't have that happen every day.

We had to learn how to talk about the book quickly before the [Oprah] interview. We hadn't started learning how to brand it or market it or message it, and then they didn't have enough books. The bookstores ran out of books because no one was expecting that. It was stressful for a while to be like, ‘Are you kidding me? We have a book that everyone wants and no one can buy it?’ But that didn't last very long

MC: If you could go back to tell yourself one thing when you were drafting the book, what would you tell yourselves? Is there anything you wish you’d known?

Tuccillo: Not really because we hashed through all the different elements of it. We would sort of joke, ‘What's going to be the backlash? There must be a backlash because anything that's popular has a backlash.’ So, we just kept waiting for it, and it never happened because nothing we were saying was so shocking.

The biggest thing that we still felt a little uneasy about is [the chapter] ‘He's just not that into if he's not asking you out’ because that means so much. What that means now is even strange. But it was the only controversial thing that people would bring up in talkbacks because we're saying for women to not take the lead and to hold back and be giving the men the power. So, it felt uncomfortable. I still back it now, but it does feel uncomfortable.

MC: Is there any advice in the book that you wouldn't include today, or that seems especially outdated?

Tuccillo I would be more self-conscious about what a heteronormative, heterosexual binary book it is. We are talking about male-female dynamics, and the world really has changed since then. I'd be clearer on the context that the book is written in, not necessarily writing the book for all the different identities out there.

Behrendt: To be honest, not that I can think of. It wouldn't have done as well if it wasn't perfect the way it was when we did it for the time. I'm glad to have been a part of the movement to call men on their shit. I don’t want to get too political, but there's a war on women, and I feel like we've gone backward in a crazy way. I feel like there was a little bit more optimism when Liz and I wrote the book—that women were having their own say about stuff.

MC: Do you think dating apps, particularly ones like Bumble where women message men first, have somewhat leveled power dynamics when it comes to dating?

Tuccillo: I think Bumble is kind of a gimmick because you could be the one who texts the man, but at the end of the day, if they don't get back to you, [or] if they are still talking to 12 other people, there's still room for very shady behavior. I don't think it really changes the dynamics that much.

In general, I think things have gotten harder. I think if the book didn't seem so dated, it would be very valuable now. I've dated online, and I think that there's so much bad behavior. In a way, dating apps bring out the worst impulses in all people. But as a straight woman, I focused on my experiences with lots of bad behavior by men.

Behrendt: I think dating apps have made [men] lazier. A man will do the least amount that he has to, to get what he wants. If he can do less, he will.

Tuccillo: The general feeling of the book is to have boundaries, have standards. And I think that that's essential when you're online dating.

MC: With social media and apps today, do you think the dating landscape has become more complicated? Or is the same issues presenting themselves in new ways?

Behrendt: I think it is a little ‘same T-shirt, different day.’ How you want to be treated and how you respect yourself applies everywhere. So that's true online as well: What you're willing to put up with and what seems like bullshit to you. If people don't want to get in person and be with you, they're not worth the time. It's [still] all about contact and being in-person.

Tuccillo: I think it is even more important that you have standards that you're judging people by and knowing very clearly what you want out of the situation, and what they're seeming to want out of a situation. When you go into online dating, you have to remind yourself: What does a guy look like, behave like, who's into me? Online dating is a numbers game, you have to really bat away the bad actors as quickly as possible to get to the ones that are there for the same reason you are there.

MC: The book ends with Liz talking about how hard it is to hold your standards high when you’re incredibly lonely. For the people looking to find a partner, what advice would you tell them to keep in mind, whether it's from the book or your personal experiences since the book was published?

Tuccillo: If you're serious about meeting people and you're mentally strong, you should try to meet people in real life and online and have a two-pronged approach. When one is getting too depressing, let the other one take control, go back and forth, or do both at the same time. I know that [with] dating online, there can be burnout, so you should pace yourself for the marathon and not the sprint.

The thing that got me through everything was having a good time with my girlfriends. You have to remember to be somebody who finds buoyancy and joy somewhere in your life because it is very, very, very difficult to date and look for love. It's hard and you have to be strong. It's almost going into battle. That's a little extreme, but you have to be strong. People are going to hurt your feelings. People are going to ghost you. People are going to be morally dubious, and you have to be strong and love yourself, and have your antenna up for getting rid of those people quickly and finding the ethical good people if that's what you're looking for.

Behrendt: I don't know who said dating was supposed to be fun. It's horrible and it has always been. Finding a partner is difficult. Finding even people that you connect with is difficult for everybody. Everybody says their city is the worst. Everybody says that their friend group is the worst. Everybody feels the exact same way, and everybody, including people you don't think would have problems, have problems. I've talked to some very famous, beautiful people who you'd be surprised to know have just ridiculous dating stories about how they've been fucked over. It's hard for everybody. That doesn't mean we quit. You have to laugh at it a little bit. You have to just have a good sense of humor about it and go, ‘Look, this is probably not going to work out, but I'll go on this date.’

MC: Two decades later, what are some of the most enduring dating lessons that still hold true?

Behrendt: A problem won't solve itself until you [have] solved your own problems. I can't tell you how many women who I've been with where they'll explain the story. It sounds hideous. You say it back to them and they're still like, ‘Yeah, I know, but I love him.’ And I'm like, ‘Well, I can't help you. I mean, I actually can't help you because you're not looking for better.’

Tuccillo: We were all so worried back then about meeting somebody and, ‘Oh, my God, it's never going to happen,’ and, ‘Oh, it seems so impossible.’ But most people end up getting married and having a family and it seems like it works out more than it doesn't. Even though it feels difficult and impossible, it happens all the time. People meet the person who they love, they get married, they have kids—it happens every day.

Look, I know dating and relationships are complicated and layered, but can you imagine getting to date Drew Barrymore and then having the audacity to ghost her? I know, I can't do it either.

Anyway, according to the actress, she has been ghosted in the past, and it was—of course—a horrible experience.

She told People, "I can't believe how much ghosting hurts. For anyone who's been ghosted out there and they feel like a brush fire went through their bodies, I totally get it. It is so strange that someone would behave that way."

She also admitted to some of her worse experiences with dating. "I've gone on dates where I'm like, 'Oh my God, why did I say yes to dinner? Why do I not know: Don't do dinner. Because we haven't ordered yet and I don't want to be here.'"

She added, "It's tough to sit down when you have so few nights off or to yourself, and you sit down, you're like, 'Sh*t, I don't want to be here.' That in itself will make you not want to date."

For the actress, dating is difficult to fit into her schedule, because in case you hadn't heard, she's got a thing or two going on in her life.

"I'm such a mom and I'm so under the workload and I love being with my friends and I love being alone, so where does [dating] fit in? I struggle with it," she explained. "My kids aren't old enough and my life isn't quiet enough."

Barrymore is mom to Olive, 10, and Frankie, 8, whom she shares with ex Will Kopelman.

She is busy hosting The Drew Barrymore Show, manning her brand Beautiful by Drew, and generally being a timeless icon, which leaves little down time.

Washington's coolest couple has called it quits. New Jersey Senator and former Presidential candidate, Cory Booker, is no longer dating his A-list action star and activist girlfriend, Rosario Dawson, Marie Claire has learned. According to an exclusive source close to the couple, after nearly three years together, Booker and Dawson decided to break up this summer, but remain friends. "The distance made it difficult," says the source. Booker, of course, balances his time between N.J. and D.C., where he has been working to get President Biden's agenda through the Senate. Meanwhile, Dawson spent the summer filming Clerks III.

Although Booker very rarely talked about his love life in the past, he sensationally admitted that he had a "boo" on radio show "The Breakfast Show" in February 2019, during his presidential campaign; Dawson admitted weeks later to a TMZ reporter at the airport that, yes, the two were in love. 

Apparently the pair initially met at a fundraiser for then–Maryland gubernatorial candidate Ben Jealous, likely in the fall of 2017. Dawson was still in another relationship at the time, so nothing came of the encounter, but the politician and actress reconnected roughly a year later. Booker told CNN at a Town Hall in March 2019, "So we met again, and I had one of those really awkward experiences. I’m a United States senator, and I had to get up the courage to walk up to her and ask her for her phone number. And [being on TV] doesn’t make me nervous, but that made me nervous."

The couple went on to have a very public courtship, appearing on the campaign trail and at movie premieres together. They were even able to weather the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. Although many Booker fans were hoping this relationship would stick—Dawson even sold her California mansion to live with Booker on the East Coast earlier this year—a second source confirmed to Marie Claire that the relationship is over. A representative from Senator Booker's office declined to comment for this story.

A complete history of the couple's time together is below, if you're feeling nostalgic.

January 2019

Rosario and Cory are spotted being "flirtatious" at the Broadway show "Dear Evan Hanson," fueling initial speculation that the two are together. The two pose with cast members backstage and Rosario is overheard telling Cory she loves him. "Dawson—who was walking across the empty stage on her way to the exit—began fooling around and singing a made-up song to Booker that went, “I love you; te amo [as in, the Spanish for ‘I love you’].”

Page Six explains that the two have known each other for "years."

A few days before that, the two had been spotted catching a movie together in New York.

February 2019

Cory hilariously confirms that he is in a relationship but doesn't say who it is. "[B]efore I declared president, I'm dating somebody really special," he told "The Breakfast Club." He added, "I got a boo."

March 2019

Rosario confirms the relationship to TMZ, saying, "I am just grateful to be with someone that I respect and love and admire so much." She added, "He's an amazing human being...It's good to spend some time together when we can."

At the CNN Town Hall where he talked about how they met, Cory also says, "I have an incredible girlfriend." He added, "She is just simply amazing and I am hopeful, as is my mother.”

April 2019

Cory makes an appearance on Rosario's Instagram, in which they both geek out over their shared excitement for Avengers: Endgame. 

June 2019

In an interview with RuPaul, both Rosario and Cory are incredibly effusive about their relationship. Rosario made a video in which she told RuPaul, "Thanks for inviting my boyfriend to be on your show so I could be in the audience and clap and cheer and scream for you." So, she was in the audience when RuPaul questioned Cory about their relationship. And Cory really brought it.

RuPaul, who's the real MVP in this situation, quizzed the presidential hopeful. "If elected, you would be the first unmarried president in a long, long time." Cory didn't miss a beat. "The swearing in isn't until the 21st of January, 2021. You never know what might happen between now and then," he said, cheekily. The camera panned to Rosario, who smiled. 

July 2019

Cory makes another appearance on Rosario's Instagram. In it, Rosario tells Cory (the pair are riding in a car together), "Love you!" He replies, "I love you so much." She captioned the photo, "Psst...pass it on. #LetLoveRule." 

August 2019

Cory and Rosario take to social media to prove that, yes, they are still dating, despite the fact that she hasn't been to every single one of Cory's campaign events. In response to a recent article that said Rosario's absence at the event was "noticeable," Cory texted Rosario to tell her, "You made it."

Rosario screenshotted the texts and captioned the photo: "I made it! To all the working mothers out there. Keep shining!" The sarcasm is perfection. Yes, Rosario has a kiddo and work of her own, and yes it is ok for her to do that while still supporting her politician boyfriend. It seems silly for them to have to reiterate it, but there we go. The two are still blissfully happy!

October 2019

Dawson took to Instagram to gush about Booker and their relationship for their one-year anniversary. In a cleverly-framed photo, Rosario is seen making a kissy-face at her BF, with whom, according to the caption, she has "never felt more connected."

Later that month, Cory gave an interview to Cosmopolitan as part of his campaign for President. In between policy talk, Cory shares insights into the couple's home life: They both love the book City of Thieves, he sends her a song every morning they don't wake up together, and cuddling up together watching TV makes him feel "cozy." 

Also in October, the couple walked the red carpet together. Booker escorted his A-list girlfriend to the premiere of her movie Zombieland: Double Tap, where the two looked absolutely adorable in matching navy suits. The two looked very in-love, snapping selfies and indulging in some PDA. Though Cory is campaigning for President, it's great to see him taking time to support Dawson's equally-as-important career. 

December 2019

The couple get a profile in the New York Times! A reporter for the paper of record followed the couple along the campaign trail and the two really opened up. "This stuff is intense. It’s really strenuous," Dawson said of Booker's run for President. "And it’s so public all the time, that there’s a really beautiful intimacy somehow that we’ve created and maintained on this journey." 

January 2020

Cory decides to end his presidential campaign. Citing a lack of resources and the looming impeachment trial of President Trump (which would keep the Senator off the trail), Team Booker announced they would close up shop. Rosario took to social media to show her support, writing, “Cory, you continue to inspire me everyday. On this journey you and your remarkable team have represented the best in us and I know you will continue to. Thank you. I see you. I love you,” according to Hola! magazine. Two days later she posted another supportive message on Instagram with a picture of the two embracing. 

June 2020

Rosario and Cory are moving in together! After quarantining separately, the couple are cutting the distance between them and taking the next—big!—step in their relationship. As first reported by People, Dawson says that she's "excited" to be living with her boyfriend, after being apart since February. 

January 2021

The A-list couple attend the inauguration of Cory's colleagues and friends (and former campaign trail competitors) Joe Biden and Kamala Harris as President and Vice President, respectively. Booker and Dawson had prime placement alongside former Presidents Obama, Clinton, and Bush, as well as Senator Bernie Sanders, Kamala's niece Meena Harris, and more. Rosario wore a very chic blue cape for the occasion; Cory coordinated in a blue tie. 

Around the same time as the inauguration, the New York Post publishes news that Rosario sold her home in Los Angeles for $2.3 million, seemingly confirming that the star is giving up the Hollywood life in favor of romance.

May 2021

Cory, a self-professed nerd, takes to Instagram to celebrate Star Wars Day and shouts out his girlfriend, who plays Ahsoka Tano in The Mandalorian. Dawson snapped the adorable pic of Booker holding a lightsaber gifted to him by his staff. 

November 2021

After months without any social media posts about each other or public appearances together, Marie Claire confirms with two sources close to Booker and Dawson that the couple is no longer together. Apparently it was distance that did them in. Booker has been working hard on Capitol Hill to pass President Biden's Build Back Better agenda and Dawson has been working on several projects, including Hulu's Dopesick, out now. We wish both of them the best!

When women ask me for one piece of financial advice that matters most, I tell them this: The best time to start investing is yesterday. Since that's not possible (yet), today is ideal.

But the reality is that not everyone is comfortable with the risk of investing. A number of you have even asked me about how one might unearth no-risk investments. Or, even better, investments that could provide a really high return without heartache (i.e. you want to find stocks like Apple or Google before they were Apple or Google).

I’m sorry to tell you that investing doesn’t work that way. When we invest, there is no such thing as returns without at least some risk. And there is no sure thing, no matter what that guy at work tells you is a “hot stock pick.” (If you’re in a Zoom meeting, feel free to turn off your camera and roll your eyes as many times as you’d like.)

That’s because markets tend to be “efficient”—there are lots of professional traders, portfolio managers, and analysts who spend their whole careers researching and investing, so the chance that the guy down the hall will consistently know more than they do, or see something that they don’t, is pretty close to nil.

But here’s the good news: There are some less sexy, low-risk ways you can earn returns.

1. Pay off credit card debt

Credit card companies usually charge you a double-digit percent interest rate on your balance (right now it’s hovering around 16 percent, on average). That’s money you pay to the credit card companies in exchange for borrowing from them. Make a plan to pay that off, and you’ll save that double-digit percent on the money you borrowed.

2. Take advantage of your employer’s 401(k) match

If your employer offers a 401(k) match, do whatever you can to take full advantage of it. Every employer’s benefits are different, so you’ll have to check for the details on exactly how yours works, but usually it’s set up so that, if you contribute part of your paycheck into your 401(k), your employer will put some in, too. There might be conditions around when that money is yours to keep, but it’s literally free money. And with the most common match being 50 cents on the dollar until you hit the max—well, that’s like a 50 percent return on your contribution.

3. Think about a savings account

If you’re truly looking for minimum risk, and you’re willing to accept minimum returns, there’s always a good, old-fashioned savings account, which is FDIC-insured (low risk) and pays a small amount in interest. Today, the average savings account interest rate is 0.06 percent. (Again: Want lower risk? Expect. lower. returns.)

At Ellevest, we typically recommend using a savings account only for your emergency fund (don’t want to risk that!) and any money you expect to need in the next one to two years.

4. Look into government bonds

When you buy bonds from the government, you’re essentially lending money to the U.S. government. They’re considered low risk because almost everyone expects the U.S. government to stay around for a long time, and to pay back its loans. (After all, the government always has the power to print more money.) Three-month bonds are currently paying 0.06 percent. If you invest in long-term U.S. government bonds, you can earn a somewhat higher return, say 1.89 percent for 30 years.

5. Have a diversified portfolio—it's your best bet to building wealth

I know, I know, it may not be the advice you came here for, but hear me out. If what you really want is a way to mute (not eliminate, but mute) the stomach-lurching market declines that can come with investing, that’s where diversification comes in.

Diversification basically means not putting all your financial eggs in one basket. It means building an investment portfolio that’s made up of many different types of investments that behave in different ways, and it’s the tried and true method of investing we use at Ellevest.

How to get started: You’ll want to start by diversifying your mix of asset classes (a fancy way to refer to the type of investments, like stocks, bonds, and “alternatives,” like real estate, for example) in your investment portfolio. The less risky types can help lessen the blow from certain curveballs that might come your way with more risky types: market downturns and, in certain cases, rising inflation. Then within those asset classes, you can diversify even further. For example, within the asset class of stocks, you can own stocks in large companies, small companies, tech companies, retail companies, U.S. companies, foreign companies ... you get the picture.

Of course, diversification has the opposite effect too: If one of your investments did turn out to be an Apple or a Google, your portfolio wouldn’t grow as much as it would have if all your money had been in that single investment. But that would be a super risky approach. Nobody can predict what will happen to an investment in the future. Virtually nobody guesses right, either.

TL, DR: Historically speaking, if you want to make your big goals a reality, the best way to build your wealth (and thus your power) is to invest consistently, a bit out of every paycheck.

Ellevest is giving Marie Claire readers $20 to start investing today. Go forth and invest!

Sallie Krawcheck is the CEO and co-founder of Ellevest, a financial company built by women, for women. She is the former CFO of Citi, and the former CEO of Merrill Lynch and of Smith Barney.

The personal data you provide dating apps (Scorpio! Dog lover!) feeds an algorithm that suggests matches. Though most companies won’t admit to sharing it with third parties … it happens. A 2020 study found that Match Group, which owns Tinder, spilled users’ political views, and in 2018, Grindr admitted to sharing its patrons’ HIV status.

We know you won’t quit on love, so here are a few tips, courtesy of Jo O’Reilly, deputy editor at ProPrivacy, to keep your private life just that.

Don't Include Identifying Information

Leave your full name, your birthday, and your place of work off your dating profile. Instead, use your first name or a nickname.

Don't Link Your Profile to Your Instagram

Keep your dating profile and your personal social-media accounts separate. You likely have more personal information on those accounts that can be used by hackers or scammers.

Don't Rush to Move Off the App

Take your time before switching to a private messaging platform like WhatsApp. Scammers want you to move to an encrypted messenger where their behavior cannot be easily monitored.

Keep Specific Details Secret

Don’t share personal details, like your pet’s name or your high school, on your public profile. This information makes it easier for hackers to guess your passwords; they can also use the info to send you phishing emails.

Limit Your Use of Location Settings

Turn off the app’s location settings, or use them sparingly. It’s better to cast a wider net than to allow strangers to pinpoint the neighborhood you live or work in.

This story originally appeared in the Fall 2020 issue of Marie Claire.

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A lot hinges on the third date with a new person. By this point, you’ve seen enough of this potential significant other to determine the direction you want this newfound relationship to go in. A casual fling, your next serious partner, someone you’re sure you never want to see again—that’s all decided by date three. It’s the date on which you show your cards, air your dealbreakers, and hold your breath, waiting for the person on the other side of the table to respond.

So when you do have cards to show, you dread this date—which is how I felt sitting across from a man with whom I could envision a future, my mouth dry and my palms slick, trying to summon the power to reveal what I thought made me incredibly undatable. It was the reason I believed I was still single after countless awkward encounters. But I could tell things were going to progress between us—I was already imagining what falling in love with this beautiful bearded man would be like—and I knew I had to give him a chance to bail. Gathering all my courage, I formed the words I hated saying out loud: “I have student debt.”

After four years at the University of New Haven, a private university I couldn’t afford, and two years earning a master’s degree in journalism from New York University, I was saddled with a $120,000 debt for a career that did not guarantee a hefty return on investment. Although I loved my chosen field, I knew there were less expensive paths I could have taken. On my worst days, I spent hours tossing and turning in bed, desperately wishing I could go back in time and persuade myself to go to a cheaper school. I wished I had understood the gravity of what I was getting myself into, but I am the first child in my family to go to college, and neither my parents nor I truly understood the enormity of the debt I would be shouldering.

I felt suffocated, like I was barely treading water in a storm. I had already cut back in every aspect of my life—living at home with my mom, bringing lunch to work every day, switching to water after only one drink on a night out with friends—and it was barely a life I wanted to live. I couldn’t fathom finding a partner to join me in this misery because, ultimately, who would want to marry that burden?

I always knew dating in New York City was going to be hard. I had never been confident—I was self-conscious about my hips, my laugh, the way I rambled when nervous—and I often thought of a first date as Judgment Day. The few minutes before coming face-to-face with a man I had swiped into existence were always the worst; my heart would beat in my throat as I imagined him sizing me up, mentally comparing me with the person he had imagined me to be.

Being both single and in debt conjures anxiety like none other. You’re already at your most vulnerable while playing the field. Now mix in the possibility of rejection based on your financial situation. I started to equate my self-worth with my net worth—and I was in the red. If you’re worth what’s in your bank account, then I wasn’t just worth nothing. I was less than nothing.

I began to think, Why bother? I felt even if someone liked me for who I was, my finances would send him running. Choosing me meant hitching yourself to my debt—and why do that when someone with fewer financial complications was only a few swipes away?

It didn’t help that those fears had been confirmed. When I casually mentioned to the law student with dark olive skin and bright eyes that I had taken out loans for school, he had all but done a spit take. His eyes went wide and his head jerked back, as though the thought of anyone but your parents paying for college was ludicrous. “For journalism?” he asked. “Good luck ever paying those off!” He laughed, then took a swig of his beer, and a hot wave of shame washed over me. There was no fourth date.

Then there was the tall bass player sleeping on a mattress on a floor in Brooklyn who, despite all better judgment, I was very into. He hadn’t finished school and politely nodded when I broached the subject. In the moment, I felt relieved, but a week later, as I obsessively checked my phone for new messages and racked my brain for reasons he had gone silent, I couldn’t come up with anything other than my debt.

Sometimes the topic would surface naturally in conversation, which makes sense considering roughly one in four Americans are paying off student loans, averaging $28,800 nationally, after graduating. This happened on my second date with a charming physicist. He mentioned how many of his classmates had six figures’ worth of debt. He felt bad for them, he said, but he couldn’t relate. His grandparents had footed his bill. I swallowed hard as my stomach sank to my feet. This time, I didn’t bother bringing up my story; I already knew how this would end. Before we parted ways, we made plans to see each other that weekend, but after two restless nights, I canceled the date, using a canned excuse. “I’m just really trying to focus on work right now,” I said. “It’s not you; I’m just not ready for a relationship.”

So, in September 2017, with a montage of these memories playing on a loop in my mind, I placed both sweaty palms on the table in front of me, looked into the eyes of the man I hoped to call my boyfriend, and said, “I have student debt. A lot of it.” He blinked once, twice, waiting for me to continue. When I didn’t, he cocked his head. “And … ?” he asked. I blurted: “Like, so much that I’ll probably be paying it off until I’m in my 60s.” He looked at me for a while longer, then shrugged his shoulders. “That blows, but you’ll get through it. You’re a motivated person.” And that was that. It didn’t come up again because he didn’t care. He didn’t like me any less. He didn’t disappear. We kept seeing each other until eventually we decided to date exclusively. My debt wasn’t the dealbreaker I had set it up to be.

Although my debt does come up when we plan for the future, it doesn’t seem like a liability; rather, it’s a challenge we’ll face together when the time comes to make big financial decisions. Since my debt-to-income ratio is skewed, we’ve discussed the possibility of leaving my name off the mortgage if we decide to buy a house. Although my debt is mine alone to pay back, he’s made it clear that I don’t have to weather the mental stress of it by myself.

Months after I bared all, he pointed out that I had gotten worked up for no reason. And that’s when it hit me: Worrying that my debt was making me undatable was what was actually making me undatable—not the debt itself. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy that I was willing into existence by stressing about it. Looking back at each failed date, I see now that it’s a very strong possibility that I was letting my anxieties and the shame I felt when I thought of my debt color how I interpreted the way those men had reacted.

Unless I’m the recipient of some huge windfall, my debt is something I’ll have to hack away at slowly over time, not something that will change overnight. What I can change is the way I perceive it and how I let it affect the way I conduct my life. My net worth doesn’t define me; my actions, my personality, and the way I live my life do. Instead of being heavy baggage, the thing I let determine my dating life, it’s now just another part of who I am. Now, two years after that fated third date, I’ve stopped worrying about it so much. Instead, I focus that energy on the relationship I’m in with the man who sat across from me that night, the one who accepted me for who I was, debt and all.

This story appears in the February 2020 issue of Marie Claire.

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In 2017, I was working at a small communications company in New York City when I became involved with a coworker. I’d never dated anyone at work before and agonized over whether to ask him out—since there were only about six of us on staff, I knew it could get messy. But the attraction and feelings were so strong that it felt like something I couldn’t let go of. It was more than a mild crush; it was the strongest and most deeply I had ever felt about someone.

“Jeff” was smart and funny. We had an undeniable chemistry and attraction that I hadn’t experienced with anyone before. We worked in an intense environment with some crazy people and having him to commiserate with helped both of us endure the long hours. We joked about our coworkers and their ridiculous habits and—like something out of The Office—would pull light pranks on our colleagues.

When we first started dating, we had the same title, so the melding of our personal and professional lives wasn’t an issue. After we’d been dating for about a month, though, things changed: I got promoted, another colleague left, and the company restructured a bit internally.

When our teams were reorganized, I became the team lead, and he had a supporting role. A trusted colleague knew about our relationship. During the internal reorg, she said to me, “You’re his boss now.” I panicked. This was what I had worked so hard to avoid. I knew he was a little insecure about the differences in our titles, and I knew these changes would make everything infinitely worse.

And, sure enough, they did.

At first, I let him do his thing, convincing myself that I trusted him enough to let him have autonomy. Things got uncomfortable whenever I saw the need to give him guidance on something. We’d had a rule: No talking about work outside of the office. But it didn’t stick. He became resentful when I corrected his work, even though he tried not to show it. He’d go out of his way to say, “I’m so glad you got promoted! I don’t have any issues with strong women!” Obviously, he was trying way too hard to prove something.

Things only got worse. After two months, we both began looking for other jobs. Ironically, he was interviewing for a position somewhere else at the same level I had been promoted to. I’d recommended that he apply for a position at his current title, and earn their appreciation and trust and get promoted based on merit. This pissed him off, I think, because it starkly illustrated my view on the differences in our quality of work.

Eventually, I left the company and we began seeing less and less of each other. Around six weeks after I started a new job, we broke up.

Even though the entire experience was difficult in so many ways, I’m grateful for the lessons I learned as a result. If that person is someone you can do without, or you’re interested only in having a fling, hold back, because the potential for disaster is enormous.

If the potential for something special is there and you decide to go for it, just keep things hush-hush. Leave work at different times. Sit apart at office gatherings. Don’t post photos on social media. Act polite but disengaged with each other in front of coworkers. Be alert about places you may bump into colleagues on the weekend—people pick up on things quicker than you realize, especially in small settings. We were extremely careful with everything we did to never give ourselves away.

Conventional wisdom rails against office relationships, but—in the end—the heart wants what it wants.

Welcome to Couples + Money, where we break through the confines of polite conversation. Forget questions about your sex life. We're getting even more personal. Let's talk about what you and your partner are doing—and not doing—with your paychecks.

Every other Thursday, an anonymous couple will get candid with MarieClaire.com about how they split their finances. We’ll break down what each person pays for individually, what they split, and all the gritty details—from who picks up the bill in restaurants to who picks fights over bank statements.

This week, we're talking with Becky, 27, a PR manager, who earns $80,000 per year ($6,666.67 per month), and her boyfriend, Ben, 30, a head of social media, who earns $115,000 per year ($9,583.34 per month). They've been together over two years and live in Brooklyn, New York.

Want to be profiled with your partner in Couples + Money? Get in touch: couples.money@hearst.com.

How It All Happened

Becky: We actually met on Tinder in April 2017.

Ben: We'd been talking for a little while on the app. We went to grab a drink at this place in Soho and started our "courtship."

Becky: We moved in together this past June. For me, I wanted to set expectations and understand, "Okay, what's after this?"

Ben: We're very committed to each other, and we have plans well into the future. I think the goal would eventually be an engagement within the next year and a half.

Our Dependents

Ben: A dog. And I take the lion's share of that responsibility. We got him in January, but we were living separately at the time, and the decision to get a dog was mostly mine.

Becky: At that point we knew we'd be moving in together. I make way less than Ben, so I'm not in a position to pay for daycare. So if it gets to a point where the dog can stay home by himself and we just need a walker once a day, I'd happily volunteer to contribute to that.

When We Told Each Other Our Salaries

Becky: We didn't blatantly talk about money for a while. In the beginning, Ben would actually foot the bill for most of our dates. So I think the first time was once we started going Dutch with stuff, six to nine months after we started dating.

Ben: Last summer we first started to share information about each other's salaries and monthly budgeting process. Hers is a lot more organized and diligent than my process, which is pretty unstructured.

How We Handle the Cost of Living

Becky: This is the first time I've lived with somebody, and I thought out of fairness, Oh, 50/50 would be good. Hindsight is 20/20—and we did actually talk about that a week ago. I said, "I'm not going to ask you to renegotiate how we split the rent for this particular yearlong lease, but moving forward, if you're going to continue to make more money than me, it needs to be be more of a 60/40 split." Within the next year, it'll shake out in different ways with him covering more dinners, but for some of those more important expenses, that'll still be split 50/50.

Why We Don't Have Joint Accounts

Ben: I think it's working for us not having a joint account. I don't have any experience with even investigating if that'd be the right solution for us.

Becky: For me personally, I'd only do that once I'm married. So in the foreseeable future but not anytime soon, and even then, I might still want to have my own individual account for what Becky wants to get for herself.

How Often We Talk About Money

Ben: An informal conversation goes on maybe once a week, since we split everything. So there's always some passing conversation about money where she'll ask, "Can you remember to Venmo me for this meal/this ride?" But in terms of budget, the two of us, it doesn't really happen.

Becky: It's an unspoken exchange that we're good about having. It's almost like we can sense each other's vibe and we don't have to make it a thing. We just know how to react if we need to have a money conversation.

What We Keep Secret

Ben: I don't feel the need to tell her about the purchases that I make, and vice versa. In terms of finances, we both live pretty independently.

Becky: If we're talking about credit cards, I'll vaguely mention, "Oh yeah, I pay my debt all the time and I don't let it get to more than X amount." A lot of times it's substantially lower than his. Also, we both have student loans. I don't know how much he has remaining. I've brought it up, but it doesn't sound like he's going to be, or wants to be, done anytime soon.

How We Learned To Budget

Ben: It's an ongoing process. And I have work to do. My parents never taught me how to budget. This has all been stuff I've just picked up along the way. I usually have a number in my checking account that I'm not comfortable with dipping below. I just keep an eye on that number, and if I get close to it, then I'll ease back on spending. I'm at a stage where I'm more concerned with enjoying my life and living comfortably. At times, that'll lead to irresponsible spending. But there'll always be a point not long after where I take a step back, assess my finances, and make a plan a few months from that point.

Becky: Growing up, I just had a knack for saving money. Even when I had different high school jobs, I would have hundreds of dollars saved. I have a single mom who was never that great with money, to be honest. After I graduated college, she noticed how good I was with money. She read a finance book and taught me how to write out a zero-based budget. Anytime you get paid, you write down the total, and then you subtract in different areas that you spend. Entertainment. Transportation. Savings, of course, and then loans, until you get all the way down to zero. And then you have physical envelopes for every bucket, and you take out cash to put in the envelopes. Anytime I'd need to pay for an expense, I'd take the cash first before I swipe. Of course, my salary has increased, and I have more expenses. And now there are situations where I don't pay with cash. But to this day, six years later, I still write it.

Ben: I have a budget on the app Mint. And I very loosely follow that. I'm a real mess when it comes to handling money. I'm fortunate not to have to keep such close track of it. But I can't say for 100 percent certain if I spend X amount and on which areas of my life. I think Becky has taught me a lot in the way she budgets her money. It's made me become more aware of how I spend and save.

Becky: Ben knows I have this crazy system. He doesn't completely get it, but he knows it keeps me financially safe. He jokingly said, "When we do have joint expenses, this is going to be crazy." I'd never want to make somebody feel like they need to do that. However, I do think there should be some sense of awareness. When and if it does come to that point of joint expenses, I think maybe we'll do an Excel tracker. I'm willing to loosen the reins a bit, but I don't want to spend just to spend.

Our Biggest Fight About Money

Becky: We've never fought about money.

Ben: We haven't. I think we had some disagreements over things we've needed. We debated over what couch to get. I was pushing for a more expensive couch that met a few criteria of mine, and she was of the position that we didn't need that. She spent time doing research to find a couch that at least met some of my criteria, for much less.

How We Pay For The Non-Essentials

Becky: Usually we want the credit card points: "I'll take the flight on my credit card. You put the hotel on your credit card." And when we travel, I don't want to dip into my savings. Ben knows I'm going to pay him back. So I'll just say, "I'll send it to you when I get paid."

What We're Banking On

Becky: I'm looking at a trip for us in December, and going to parents for Thanksgiving.

Ben: A cross-country move is something that I have in the back of my mind, always, to have a cash reserve to pay for. Otherwise we're living in New York, struggling to bank enough money for any meaningful life investment like a house or car. We both have family in California. Becky loves the sun and the beach too much to be living in the Northeast. And I've always heard of how transformative of an experience it is to move from the East Coast to the West Coast. I feel like it's our turn to have that experience.

Interviews have been condensed and edited for clarity. Pseudonyms have been used. Reporting and editing by Katherine J. Igoe. Design and illustration by Morgan McMullen. Animation by Hayeon Kim and Colin Gara.

For more stories like this, including celebrity news, beauty and fashion advice, savvy political commentary, and fascinating features, sign up for the Marie Claire newsletter.

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You’ve swiped right so many times it’s beginning to feel wrong. If only there were no- and low-tech ways to have a social life. Um, there are.

We hit up experts—matchmakers, relationship gurus, lifestyle coaches, and a single woman in New York City with a kickass social life—for tips on how to meet someone IRL. Here are 11 ways to get out of the dating-app trap.

In other words: Delete, delete, delete. “You’ll be less tempted if you don’t have access to your favorite apps,” says Sophia Reed, PhD, a marriage and family therapist. “And even for those times when you are tempted, you’ll think twice because you’d then have to download it again.”

You can spend time writing that you like a good poetry slam, riding bikes, or kayaking—or you can actually do it. “Make a list of a few things you would like to see or do outside of your house or apartment,” suggests Tammy Shaklee, founder of H4M, a matchmaking service for gay professionals.

“When you're there, don’t get on your device—pretend your battery is dead if you have to. Look up and around, as though you were waiting for a friend to meet you, but they’re running late. Make eye contact, ask a question of a fellow attendee."

Doing the same things with the same people will yield the same results. “If you have a routine and see the same friends all the time, branch out. Volunteer, attend a charity event, try a new fitness class,” says Rori Sassoon, co-founder of Platinum Poire, an upscale matchmaking agency in New York, and author of The Art of the Date. “You’ll broaden your horizons and your circle at the same time.”

We’re talking about the one who strikes up a conversation standing in line at Starbucks, sitting in the next seat on a flight, or sizing up the produce at the grocery store. “Wherever you find yourself, put yourself out there,” says Wyatt Fisher, PsyD, a marriage counselor in Boulder, Colorado. “Strike up a conversation. You never know when one of them could lead to more.”

Do some matchmaking of your own and set up a friend. “I’ve gone on dates with people who were great, but not great for me,” says Lisa Holden, a 30-something single woman in New York City.

“When there’s no one out there I’m interested in, I go through my dating history and look for folks I can set up. I once went on two great dates with a guy who was awesome and ended up connecting him with a friend of a friend and they hit it off. It felt great to make a love connection for someone else, and I have to believe it did good things for my dating karma.”

Where would they go? What would they do? “If you’d love to have a partner who reads a lot, become a regular browser at your local bookstore or public library,” says Ana Jovanovic, a clinical psychologist.

“If you want to meet someone who shares your passion for art, see an exhibition at the local gallery or a museum. Perhaps you’d like to meet an animal lover—volunteer at an animal shelter. Be creative. The possibilities are endless.”

“Ask to be added to their free database,” says matchmaker and dating coach Karenna Alexander. “You never know when they’ll sign up a client who wants someone just like you.”

“Speed dating has been elevated and I’ve had success with a company called CitySwoon,” says single-girl Holden. “For a small fee, they make it easy for singles to show up at a bar and get instantly matched for brief conversations. It’s an efficient way to have a handful of dates in one night.”

To stay offline, repeat after us: Catfishing, ghosting, lying, creeps. “Remember the reason you quit online dating is that it wasn’t serving you in some way,” says Reed. “Either you weren’t getting dates, or you were getting bad dates, meeting crazy people, and not meeting quality people.”

“Many of us go to the gym to train our bodies, but most of us don’t train our minds. When you’re looking for love, you have to create a mindset that love is abundant, easy to find, and all around you,” Kara Loewentheil, a life coach and dating guru.

“With that thought in your brain you’ll see opportunities for connection everywhere. But if your thought is ‘This is so hard, no one meets in real life’ or ‘I’m not cool enough,’ you literally might not register that your soulmate is trying to flirt with you in the grocery store line. The way you think about yourself is the most important element of successful dating.”

“Eating at the bar and chatting with the bartender can lead to a phone number exchange; a trip to the museum might yield a coffee with a friendly entomologist," shares Holden. "But that's never the goal."

“The goal is to treat myself the way I’d like to be treated and take some time for self care. I take my time getting ready: I put on my pre-date playlist and I intentionally spend some time and money only on myself, doing something I’d like to do.”

Sure, it’s not as fun as sipping craft cocktails or taking selfies at a baseball game, but discussing your birth control plan is an important first (yes, we said first) step in any sexual relationship. Whether you're not looking for anything serious or you’re in it for the long haul, The Talk needs to happen and it needs to happen early. Here’s how to do it without dying of awkwardness.

Maybe not the most steamy way to think about it, but you wouldn’t sign a lease or start a new job without understanding all the terms and conditions, would you? Same goes with new sexual relationships, says Tosha Rogers, MD, an ob-gyn in Atlanta.

“Put all the terms upfront,” she says. “Then you get to decide if you want to be a part of that relationship, even if it’s a casual one.”

Those terms should include asking your partner about the last time they were tested for STIs, and then discussing both of your results in person.

“A lot of my patients will say, ‘Well, I trust them,’” Dr. Rogers says. “It’s not about trust. He or she is probably very trust-worthy and a nice person. I just asked if they were HIV+ or not. Totally different questions!”

Don’t wait until the clothes are hitting the floor to bring up your birth-control game plan. Instead, work it into an early-in-the-game conversation—say, when you’re talking about past relationships and the things that turn you on.

Cringing at the thought? Memorize this script compliments of Dr. Rogers: “Just say, ‘Hey, I’m on the pill. It regulates my period and I know that I won’t get pregnant, and for all the other stuff, are you OK with using condoms?’ All of those things need to be negotiated, and that’s why I tell my patients to do it early on: to see if this is a deal you want to make or not.”

Last step: Go over what you would do if your birth control plan fails—the pill is 99 percent effective with perfect use (91 percent with typical use), and condoms are 98 percent effective with perfect use (85 percent with typical use).

Coming up with a backup plan (such as taking Plan B if a condom breaks and you’re not taking an alternative form of birth control) means your bases are covered—and isn't peace of mind kind of, yes, sexy?

Just a refresher: The pill or an IUD are great for preventing pregnancy, but they don’t protect you from STIs. And not to scare you, but some STIs are untreatable, and others, like HPV, can even cause cervical cancer. Just another reason it’s so important to have the birth control chat before you jump between the sheets.

What you do with your body (and whom you do with your body) is ultimately your decision, and no one should pressure you into making a choice about the kind of birth control you should use.

“It’s all about negotiation,” Dr. Rogers says. “If you have blood clotting disorders and don’t want to be on the pill, then I don’t feel like it’s [your partner’s] right to say what you need to do. He can say, ‘Let’s go learn about some things together and see if there’s anything you are in agreement to taking, because condoms are not failure-proof and I don’t want to have a baby right now.’ That’s reasonable.” (Fine, he probably won't put it quite as eloquently as an ob-gyn, but if he's not amenable to finding a solution that works for you, uh... *pointed look*.)

Loop in your doctor, too, so you can nail down the best birth control plan for your body and then relay the message to your partner, Dr. Rogers says. And if you and your boo can’t find common ground, it might be the relationship you need to reconsider, not your birth control plan.

Though I’m a huge baseball fan, I’m not really sure where the phrase “out of your league” originated. Come to think of it, I’m not even sure it has anything to do with baseball [Editor's note: It does; it has to do with the fact that there are various baseball leagues (minors and major) stratified by ability and professionalism], but I do know that I have viewed almost every man I’ve ever been attracted to as out of mine. Out of my league is my home base, the place I operate from. It’s like a switch box inside my brain that sends me signals at different times to remind me that I am not on the same level as these men. I’m going to the same schools as them, I’m working at their companies, I’m drinking the same tequila, but it never feels like we’re in the same stratosphere.

I’m 27, and the first time I’ve ever felt confident was only two years ago. That was when I dedicated myself to writing, and actually got something published. Until then, I’d spent the majority of my life not liking who I was, and I relied on self-deprecation to deflect from my insecurities. But writing made me feel worth something, and I attempted to use that build up my own confidence. It’s an everyday process: Confidence in my work is one battle, confidence with potential romantic partners is a separate one that, incidentally, feels like scaling a mountain of garbage bags.

A few months ago, my mind landed on a random guy I knew from college. I immediately reminded myself that he was out of my league...and then paused. I thought of the last guy I had feelings for and, like an instinct, reminded myself that he, too, was out of my league. I suddenly realized that I repeat this thought process for every person I’m attracted to. With my newfound self-assurance, I decided to dig in: Why do I do this? Are these men actually better than me, or had I just been putting myself down? And what metric did I even judge “out-of-my-league-ness” by?

So, in the spirit of someone who can take ownership of being insecure, I decided to seek these guys out. I wanted to learn about these people I’d shoved out of my realm of possibility to see if my newfound confidence cast them in a different light. I was excited when five of them agreed to talk: They’re bankers and managers and other professions that your grandparents would be impressed by, and they look different and believe in different things and have different interests and passions. But what they share is that, at one point, I labeled all of them too good for me. It was time for a discussion.

Max

Age: 27
Occupation: Finance at a big firm
How we met: The University of Scranton, where romance thrives
When I decided he was out of my league: Last summer when he asked me to grab drinks
Why I thought he was out of my league: In college, women seemed to line up around the block for Max. He’s tall, handsome, has a good job, likes books—I could keep going about his excellent qualities, but I’m starting to sound creepy and my mother is going to read this (she’s already not thrilled).
Fun fact: He posted a photo with an alpaca in Peru this summer and I was unnerved.

Over artichoke dip at a bar in Midtown Manhattan, Max and I had a shockingly open conversation. We theorized about the idea that maybe for some people, the insidious self-doubt one develops in middle school can linger for years afterward. We talked about how we’ve changed since college. Max said he was a different person then—younger, drunker, more reckless with the emotions of other people. He used to be someone who would rely on women for emotional support without giving them what they wanted or needed in return.

And Reader: I’ve never in my life heard a man openly admit to leading women on, so I give Max credit for that.

He says he’s growing and he’s constantly putting in the work to be better than he was before. Back in college, I never would have taken Max for someone who struggles with self-confidence. He’s over six feet tall! He has a job in money or whatever! He speaks different languages! But when I asked him about where he gets his assurance, he looked at me and said, “I wake up, and there are days where I’m genuinely like, ‘I am the ugliest human being in the world.’”

It felt like a slap in the face in the best possible way. Maybe I needed to hear that someone whom I’d placed on a higher pedestal could feel the way that I’ve often felt. Overall, a good conversation.

Will

Age: 29
Occupation: Project Manager
How we met: Will sat next to me in freshman year theology
When I decided he was out of my league: The moment Will sat next to me in freshman year theology
Why I thought he was out of my league: He’s the quintessential guy in college you ran into at lunch who made you nervous-giggle.
Fun fact: I have no idea what grade Will got in our theology class. I keep forgetting to ask.

I was especially nervous to meet with Will because, if I’m being frank, he has a perfect face and I was afraid to speak into it. Will expressed that he considers a woman out of his league only when he hasn’t gotten the chance to know her. “There’s this feeling that she’s got experiences that I don’t have,” he says. “By being familiar with a thing I’m not familiar with, she’s [in a way] a step above me, on a small scale.”

I asked him about confidence. “I take this active step in saying, I’m going to be confident, then it almost makes itself happen after that,” he said. It sounds silly, but I was once again surprised to hear someone like Will use the word “active” in relation to his experiences with self-assurance. Before these conversations, I really did believe that they were just confident because of who they were, both on paper and in real-life. And I was who I was—a frazzled troll doll of a human who is just happy to be here. With Will, I was already learning that this isn’t always the case.

Anthony

Age: 26
Occupation: Medical Student
How we met: When we were kids; our moms are best pals
When I decided he was out of my league: A few summers ago, our families vacationed together. I hadn’t seen him in years, probably since we were children
Why I thought he was out of my league: Anthony is athletic, smart, and one of the kindest people I’ve ever known. He’s funny and he played hockey and he seems to have a handle on things.
Random fun fact: He has a dog named Sunshine!

Turns out, Anthony struggles with confidence, too! (Noticing a pattern?) But his was more professional: Anthony is studying to be a doctor, something he previously thought he was incapable of doing. “I thought it was way out of my reach,” he said. “I automatically assumed I was someone who was unintelligent and didn’t have the work ethic, and someone who didn’t have the capability to excel or get to medical school.”

I asked Anthony about his initial reaction to hearing that I believed he was out of my league. He said the overall sentiment didn’t exactly make him feel good. “It was a little bit of a shock, I had never viewed myself as that, as somebody that was unattainable,” he said. He appreciated the project though, and whatever I was trying to achieve in asking these questions. He closed our conversation with, “More people should welcome the need to find answers to things, to find answers to difficult questions. I don’t think enough people are willing to take the necessary steps to figure out those answers.”

Claudio

Age: 27
Occupation: Registered Nurse
How we met: We went to neighboring high schools
When I decided he was out of my league: Around the time he expressed interest in wanting to date me
Why I thought he was out of my league: I had absolutely no self-esteem and I just couldn’t fathom someone being interested in me
Random fun fact: In high school, my friends and I invited Claudio and his best friend over on a random weekend to play video games. My dad came home unexpectedly and I hid Claudio and company in my closet. Memories!

Claudio was my first-ever boyfriend! We dated our senior year of high school. I couldn’t believe he actually wanted to date me—I couldn’t believe anyone wanted to date me. At age 17, every other sentiment I muttered was a joke about how I was either ugly or stupid.

Claudio was funny, driven, and nice to look at. (He is still all of those things!) We hadn’t spoken in about a decade so I had no idea what to expect, but he talked a lot about his job as a nurse and how he didn’t pass his licensing exam until the third try. “Anyone who says they’ve never felt unworthy is lying,” he said matter-of-factly. He also had a profound point about how, in our culture, it can feel like there’s absolutely no room for mistakes. “There’s an overwhelming sense of making sure you never look stupid on social media or even say anything dumb in real life,” he said. “It’s like we’re not allowed to make mistakes anymore, because it’ll be hung over our heads for the rest of our lives.”

This interaction in particular made me think about how to reconcile who I was when I was younger with who I am now. I’ve gone from a teenager with a palpable and all-consuming lack of self-esteem to an adult who recognizes that I need confidence to survive in this world. I have a lot of work to do, but 17-year-old me would not recognize 27 year old me—a woman who claims space and actively tries to be present and confident. For that, I’m very grateful.

Leo*

Age: 27
Occupation: Alumni director
How we met: Through a mutual friend.
When I decided he was out of my league: As soon as I met him. Leo is brilliant and essentially the poster child for “man you bring home to your mother to ensure that she will break out in violent sobs of relief and joy.”
Why I thought he was out of my league: Please see above.
Random fun fact: He both respects and encourages my love for telling men on dating apps that I like their bowties.

When I first asked Leo about someone being out of his league, a specific instance came to his mind. As I previously stated, Leo is smart. He went to a really good high school, he went to a really good college. When I heard in passing that he became a Fulbright scholar, I felt zero percent surprised. In our conversation, however, I learned Leo didn’t have the assuredness I’d given him in my mind. Upon moving to another country for his scholarship, he says that he thought, What in the world did I do to deserve this?

I never knew Leo immensely well, but I remember him from 10 years ago. He was intelligent, kind, and had a smile that made mere mortals melt. Leo told me that he grapples with body insecurity; how, if he has to change in a public setting, he’ll do it as quickly as possible. Leo is someone I look at with great reverence, and I’m grateful to him for expressing such vulnerability in his feelings of unworthiness regarding his mind and his body.

With my social media and culture obsession, I am constantly putting myself into a different category: There are the smart, attractive people, and then there’s me. Leo reminded me that I don’t know these people, who are likely categorizing and battling themselves in their own ways. I don’t know the inner workings of someone’s soul—no matter who they are or how attractive they are. I do not have a monopoly on self-doubt.

After these interviews, I felt like I had reached my vulnerability cap for the year. I gave each of these men a ton of power in the past, a power that none of them even asked for. For years, a chorus sang to me in my head: “You’re ugly! You’re stupid! You don’t deserve a good thing with a good person!” Now, I feel a bit more equipped to tell that chorus to shut up.

It’s not like this project was a silver bullet: I still feel self-doubt to my core. But I’m trying to overcome it, and hearing that these people are too made me feel less alone. I have to accept the ways I’ve hated myself and confront my tendency to do so. Mostly though, I need to believe in myself the way I’ve believed in others, to actively work toward being the woman I want to be—someone confident in her belief that she deserves good things and good people. No more conversations about metaphorical leagues.

*Names have been changed by request where indicated

QYou know Bumble’s app is great for dating (maybe you’ve even used it to find a match or two), but did you know that it can help you build a network, find a mentor, and even set you up with your next badass boss?

Bumble Bizz is Bumble’s career-focused platform, joining Bumble Date and Bumble BFF in helping to empower women and end misogyny throughout the world (lofty goals, and we’re all for it!). On Bumble, women are in control—they have to make the first move on swiping right. The app has over 50 million users worldwide, so chances are good that you’ll make some great connections.

So what’s the best way to go about making these connections? Bumble has a new resource to help you. They just came out with their first magazine—Bumble Mag—that’s filled with stories on harnessing your inner power; building stronger, happier relationships; and helping you navigate our frenetic, 24/7 world.

And there’s a whole section devoted to you and work: In one piece, Bumble interviews its data guru on what types of Bizz profile pics result in the most connections (eye contact and smiles, among other things). There’s a story on what to wear to work when you don’t work in an office (sneakers, sneakers, sneakers).

There’s a Q&A analyzing all the awkward “professional” situations you find yourself in (no matter how much you hate it, you should not ghost a job). And speaking of awkward, Bumble tackles office life in the #MeToo era, helping you achieve success and combat sexism for a better future.

When you’re finished reading Bumble Mag’s Bizz section, turn to the sections on friends, dating, and self-care. Discover some fabulous destinations to visit with your girlfriends, read about what dating will look like in 20 or 30 years, and learn how to really, truly practice mindfulness.

For more on the magazine, including how to get your hands on the first issue for free, click here. Hurry—it’s only while supplies last!

Take a moment to mourn my Queen Elyse, y'all, a victim of the "Dating On The Bachelor Is Not Like Real Life" curse that plagues one contestant every season. Elyse chose to make her exit in this episode because she can see that the other relationships in the house are moving quicker than hers is with Colton, and she doesn't think she can make it in time for a possible engagement at the end. And you know what? She's right. If she's not capable, she shouldn't be there. If she's feeling jealous, or doesn't like watching other girls date her boyfriend, she has the right to leave. The Bachelor is dating turned up to 11. Elyse's response was mature, it was enlightened, and my favorite part is that she did the entire thing in one of the best dresses this franchise has ever seen.

When Elyse popped out in that white dress with her hair in an updo and her face painted for the gods, my wig flew across the room. I knew the drama was coming. When she looked beautiful while she told Colton she was leaving, I was imagining all of the best outfits I could wear while dramatically exiting the reality television show I am the star of in my own brain.

AND IT HAD POCKETS. My wig is around the corner and up the street. I know ABC thought it had a wig-snatching moment with Jocey Grocey—I mean, Heather—going from Never Been Kissed to Has Been Kissed, but my wig was firmly attached. I see what you were trying there, ABC.

To add a layer onto the tragedy cake that was this episode ofThe Bachelor —a survival date? Really? I'd rather do last week's Bungee date and get whiplash than ever go searching for water in a jungle.

Elyse's Dramatic Exit Dress is sold out, and it was 58 dollars. I stan a budget-minded queen! But never fear, I've found one that's pretty similar just for you, my dear reader, who comes to me for fashion advice, clearly.

Now, I'm not pretending I'm competing on The Bachelor. But if I was, here are some other statement dresses I would wear, because if I'm going to be a dramatic girl, I'm going to remind you I Didn't Come To Play, I Came To Slay. But I don't imagine myself being an Onyeka or a Demi, but rather a Katie (my new queen, give Katie more screentime) or even a Cassie (that date...If I didn't already have my thoughts on her, they're solid now. My GOD.)

Sit in the background, be fabulous, charm a few people from time to time. You know, easy stuff.

Dear producers: Please cast me on this show, if only for the fashion.

For more stories like this, including celebrity news, beauty and fashion advice, savvy political commentary, and fascinating features, sign up for the Marie Claire newsletter.

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At the end of every work week, Bumble CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd likes to slow things down for her team. Often this means staying at HQ—a playful mid-century-style pad of many yellows and hexagonal motifs—to treat the now-60-person team based in Austin, Texas, to manicures in the designated Glam Room (which doubles as a nursing haven for new moms). But today she takes them to the local Alamo Drafthouse Cinema to see RBG, the recently released documentary about iconic Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. The group of staffers, mostly women, fills seats around Wolfe Herd; the theater, with its menu of food and cocktails, provides a giddy sense of playing hooky rather than one of required reading. Betty Boop for President, a slyly subversive black-and-white cartoon, plays before the documentary. The two films are an appropriate combo fort his gang: Bumble is nothing if not woman-centric, and its notions of womanhood intertwine strands of the cute with the noble, the ambitious with the decorous, and the feminine with the feminist.

A plate of chicken tenders on her lap, Wolfe Herd visibly relaxes when the lights go down. Watching the film, she seems to give herself over to not being Whitney Wolfe Herd, tech-startup mogul. For the first time all day, she’s just a 29-year-old at the movies.

Teetering between these two worlds has its price. Earlier in the day, soon after we meet, Wolfe Herd breezily says she feels dizzy. “Does that ever happen to you? I think it’s anxiety. I have so much. Yesterday, I cried for 2 minutes in my kitchen. Why is that?” Wolfe Herd says she used to try to hide her anxiety, but “if people look at me and think I’ve got it all together, why not tell the truth?”

One could forgive Wolfe Herd for feeling a little anxious. She’s running a relationships platform with over 35 million users globally that is already in the U.S., Europe, Canada, Australia, Mexico, and Latin America and is launching in India this fall. Bumble BFF, a feature to connect with new friends, recently crossed three million users, and Kris Jenner announced in April she was using Bumble Bizz, the app’s professional networking service, to hire an assistant. Bumble is countersuing Match Group, which owns Tinder, for $400 million. (The legal back-and-forth started last February, after Match reportedly said it was interested in acquiring Bumble, which opened its books. When Bumble turned down Match’s acquisition offer, Match sued for alleged intellectual-property infringement.) Wolfe Herd joined Imagine Entertainment’s board of directors in July, and in August, Bumble launched Bumble Fund, a venture-capital arm that invests in women-led businesses. When I meet with Wolfe Herd in June, she is also nursing her husband, Michael Herd, an executive at an oil company who recently had follow-up back surgery after surviving a near-fatal car accident in 2017, and overseeing the second-floor renovation of their house. Oh, and Bumble is getting into the beauty game.

Yes, you read that correctly. Bumble has spent several months working with psychotherapists and dermatologists to make serums that simultaneously solve skin and, according to the company, emotional issues. In mid- to late-2019, Bumble will launch two serums with quirky names, like Break Up With Bad, the line’s facial oil for “breakups and breakouts.” And that’s just the beginning.

Empowering women is Wolfe Herd’s cornerstone, the motivator that fuels all of her ambitious plans. She says her personal goal is to eradicate misogyny—to make it illegal. When I ask if she thinks it’s truly possible to put an end to a phenomenon that has been around since time immemorial, she looks at me squarely, pauses, and says, “We can try.” It’s why she’s working with legislators to get a bill passed that would make sending unsolicited pictures of genitalia an offense similar to flashing in public. (The conversations are so preliminary that it’s too early to name specific legislators, says Bumble.) If a man who’s been rebuffed by a romantic interest hostilely sends an “eggplant pic,” Bumble’s coy reference to a “dick pic,” Wolfe Herd wants him to be held accountable. She points to a nearby stop sign. “If you run it, you get arrested. Laws attach consequence.”

So much of Wolfe Herd’s impetus to cast a wide net and make as much impact as possible stems from her life experiences. “They say that the greatest companies in the world come out of someone’s personal heartbreak,” she says. Wolfe Herd famously sued Tinder, which she cofounded, for sexual harassment after being fired in 2014. Though she’s legally barred from discussing the suit, which the two parties reportedly settled for $1 million, she does say that four years ago, “it wasn’t #MeToo; it was #MeOnly.” Years before, in her first romance as a teenager in Salt Lake City, she dated someone who “told me what clothes to wear, certain friends to stay away from, how everyone was prettier than me, and then he would disappear for days. Talk to any FBI agent. They’ll tell you the easiest way to torture someone is the silent treatment. It is severe physical and mental torture,” she says. “My mom had to literally intervene. She went to his house and said, ‘Stay away from my daughter.’”

Despite her desire to squash the gender-fueled behavior she dealt with as she came of age, Wolfe Herd still straddles the line between the classic and ultramodern paradigms of being a woman. “Sometimes she wants to be the traditional wife. She’ll work a 12-hour day and come home. I’ll say, ‘Let’s order in,’ and she’ll want to cook dinner instead,” says her husband. Wolfe Herd has cultivated a public persona that screams lovely; think Audrey Hepburn—if Hepburn used terms like “intersectional feminism.” But Herd adds, “No Harvard Business School tells you how to do what Whitney’s done. She stood up against a multibillion-dollar corporation that had every ability to swallow her up. You don’t leave Exxon and start Chevron. She did. It’s unbelievable: Her ambition, strength, and ability to persevere have created so much success.”

Yet Wolfe Herd often tempers that success with a kind of prettiness and accessibility that seem to prove she doesn’t feel times have changed enough—something she discusses regularly with her good friend Ty Haney, the founder and CEO of Austin-based Outdoor Voices sportswear. “Men are expected to be ruthless. They’re allowed to cut people down. I feel like I have this expectation to bend, to fold, to be nice to everyone, and if I’m not I’m labeled a B-I-T-C-H,” says Wolfe Herd. Haney says the performance expectations for men and women are the same, but “there are more eyeballs on our trajectories. More criticism.” It’s why the two spend early mornings paddleboarding on Lake Austin, just off of Wolfe Herd’s lawn, or playing tennis on her court. “There aren’t many female founder-CEOs. It’s quite lonely,” says Haney. Having Wolfe Herd as a peer, a friend, has been helpful personally and professionally. “My motto is ‘totally possible.’ With Whitney, it’s ‘beyond totally possible.’ She’s like a queen bee. Her energy attracts people. She’s my brain trust,” says Haney. “Whitney is so good at taking care of people. She’s a boss-mama.”

A woman pushing boundaries, even if she’s doing so under the cover of beauty and charm, can easily anger a faction of men in this country. In April, two months after the Parkland shootings, Bumble banned guns from profile pictures, and Wolfe Herd received an angry email from one man who threatened “to put his Glock and his you-know-what in my mouth,” sending a picture of each. Another critic reportedly published false rumors about her, accompanied by her picture and her cell number, on neo-Nazi site the Daily Stormer in 2017; the company received hundreds of messages from men detailing how they wanted to mutilate the female employees and writing that women existed only for their pleasure. The Austin police camped out at Bumble’s offices for a week, and the FBI got involved. Today, a source close to Wolfe Herd says her house in a gated community has multiple security systems, Bumble’s new HQ has full-time security, and Wolfe Herd travels with a bodyguard.

All the pushback, the lawsuits, and the ugly threats do is motivate her. Just before Wolfe Herd takes her staff to see RBG, there is an all-hands meeting at HQ. Everyone gathers in an open central space on long yellow velvet couches. Wolfe Herd sits just apart and is being videoed for satellite offices—about 30 employees work outside of Texas, in cities like New York, Paris, Mexico City, London, and Sydney—to watch her answer anonymous questions submitted by employees. The last one: What is the future of Bumble?

To grow. “I fucking love this,” Wolfe Herd says of the challenge. “I want to take this sucker around the planet. Then, who knows, maybe we’ll work with Bezos and Musk and take it beyond.”

This article originally appeared in the October 2018 issue of Marie Claire.

Not that life ever feels like you think it should at a certain age, but at 30, I felt as if things were going pretty well. I was running my own digital-strategy consultancy and it was actually making money, I had learned that two cocktails were more than enough on a date, and I was finally living in an apartment—in Brooklyn—furnished with more than just a blow-up mattress. But something was missing. Most of my friends were coupled up, and I wasn’t. We were in different places in life. I didn’t have a group of friends, or even a few, who were free to spend time with me, to Netflix and chill in the most literal sense of the phrase.

Enter Bumble BFF, the supposedly squad-building feature on the same dating app I’d been using for the previous six months to meet men. I was curious albeit skeptical. Online dating, or employing a website or app to find a potential partner, has lost much of its stigma; there are 40 million Americans using dating websites, as reported by eHarmony, and 20 percent of relationships today started online. Still, there was just something that felt taboo in utilizing that same technology to meet friends.

Anyone who has to use technology to make friends must not be able to make them in real life, right? Then again, when was the last time, post-college or grad school, you actually made a new, lasting friendship? Not a coworker you only gossip with during coffee breaks. Or someone you always exchange a smile with at Saturday morning yoga.

Plus, going on a friend-date did sound better than going on a date-date. On a friend-date, there’s unfiltered conversation. You’re not worried about presenting the best version of yourself and molding her to fit the interests of the person sitting across from you. There are no awkward “Who’s going to pay?” conversations or fake-out wallet grabs. And friend dates don’t end with dodging an unwanted kiss goodnight and hoping he doesn’t follow you home, like in the opening scene of a Lifetime movie. I wanted a friend to come over and lounge on my couch and drink wine with and laugh over the latest swipe-right disaster story. What’s a first date-date if you can’t share with friends?

One night, as I sat on my couch and opened the app to swipe right and left on a new slew of shirtless bathroom selfies, office-friendly headshots, and photos of single guys posing with cute pets, in spite of my hesitations, I decided to try BFF.

I scrolled through dozens of women whose profiles said things like “I just moved back to the city in July and I’m looking to build an awesome girl squad!” and “Have lived here for seven years and many of my friends have moved away!” Instead of cheesy pickup lines and height measurements, their bios had a few lines about work, what they liked to do for fun, and why they’d ventured to the BFF side of Bumble. I was still skeptical. I saw interesting women and wanted to connect but feared ultimately we never would. If you’ve used dating apps, you know that follow-through can be the biggest hurdle.

An hour later, I got my first match: Chantal, a 34-year old marketing executive. Her bio read, “My life is dope. I have an interesting career, live in a sweet apartment with the man of my dreams (and our cute cat) in our favorite city. Just missing the BFF to cheer each other on, watch sci-fi, play board games, work out, drink wine, and go on adventures with.” After reading her bio and swiping through her photos a few times, I messaged her: “Sci-fi, board games, wine...I’m in!” Before I hit “send,” I added the smiley-face emoji, the one with hearts as eyes. Then I erased it and added the hand-raised emoji instead to show I’m enthusiastic but not crazy. A few seconds later, I got a message back: “What was that? Like the best opening message EVER?” Much like a conversation with a would-be romantic partner, Chantal and I continued messaging through the Bumble app, asking basic questions. “Where are you from originally?” Then we exchanged numbers to talk by texting and got deeper. “It’s so hard to work from home and meet new people,” I confessed.

This wasn’t Chantal’s first Bumble BFF friend-date. She had not only met but made friends with a few women through the app. She told me how she was going on a trip with two of them the following weekend. We hadn’t even met yet and I was already kind of jealous. Didn’t her bio say she was looking for “the BFF,” not BFFs? I found an amazing woman, who seems really into me, but she’s already seeing other people? That night we made a plan to get together later in the week.

I went to bed with a new event on my calendar: “Liz & Chantal meet!” Chantal had sent a meeting invite that popped up as a notification for my Google Calendar. I imagined the event on her calendar, our date sandwiched between her last work meeting and working out. She’s just like me, I thought. She schedules everything, even social activities.

A few days later, after circling the block several times, I finally walked through the revolving door of her apartment building and rode the elevator up to the sixth floor. I wasn’t sure if I should knock, ring the bell, or text, “I’m here!” I tapped lightly and waited. When she opened the door, she was wearing a black T-shirt and jeans. I took my shoes off and made my way to the dining-room table. She took a seat across from me, set a cheese plate down between us, tilted her head to the side in curiosity, and asked, “So, how are you?” in a way that made me feel like she really wanted to know.

For the next three hours, we shared stories about dating, family, and moving to New York—and I devoured every piece of Brie on the plate. I didn’t have to feign that I wasn’t starving because I wasn’t on a date with a guy, pretending to be ladylike. I told her about my latest romantic Bumble encounter with a quirky comedian. I loved hearing about how she had moved from South Africa to Boston, recently making her way to New York. She wanted more details on my Midwestern roots. We were both endlessly frustrated with our family members who shared their political views on Facebook. We had stepdads we loved and dads we spent more time talking about in therapy than actually talking to. On the train ride back to Brooklyn later that night, I couldn’t help but think, That’s the best first date I’ve ever been on.

I wondered if it would remain just that—a first date after which the excitement fades and you become strangers again, like it never happened. But the excitement didn’t fade. A few weeks after we met, I had a week filled with anxiety. One of the best employees on my team unexpectedly quit, and I was overwhelmed with my to-do list. It was hard to get out of bed. When I told Chantal, she encouraged me to meet her at her office. We walked to lunch, and she listened as I vented. “I’ll introduce you to a few people who might be a good fit for the job,” she said. “You’ll find someone, and I’ll help you.” By the end of the day, I had a handful of e-mails from Chantal introducing me to qualified candidates who were interested in the job. The next morning, she sent a text checking in on me: “How are you feeling today? Let me know if you want matzo ball soup. I’m a connoisseur.”

Like a date-date, they’re not all going to be gems like Chantal. But if we’re willing to swipe left and right to meet potential S.O.s, why not do the same to build a community of friends too? Over the last six months, Chantal has become one of the most important people in my life.

Unlike actual dating, you don’t have to deactivate your account when you meet “the one.” Chantal introduces me to her new Bumble BFF matches from time to time. Me, I open the app a little less. When I feel lonely, instead of reaching for the app, I might text or call Chantal to get together, just like I wanted.

This article appeared in the August 2018 issue of Marie Claire, on newsstands now.

Nicki Minaj is here to give you all the relationship advice you will ever need, and it all comes courtesy of her own life experiences. In a recent series of tweets promoting the release of her upcoming album, Queen, which hits stores on August 10, Minaj opened up in a big way about her romantic history and offered some unsolicited (but extremely relevant) advice for other women.

She started with some background about her own love life, which has been playing out in the public eye for years now.

#Queen, know your worth. I’ve been proposed to 3 times; asked by 4 boyfriends to have their child. Being emotionally, mentally, or physically abused just to crack a fake smile on the gram & show off a ring is not happiness. Being cheated on, humiliated, belittled… for the gram?”

Then came a quick transition from vulnerably sharing her own story to offering advice for other women.

“#Queen, know your worth. You were a Queen before him," she wrote. "You’ll be a Queen after him. He can’t make or break you. Being equally yoked is what you should strive for. Spirituality is key. Once your spirit can soar on its own, then you are ready to “allow” him the privilege of ur time."

Next, Minaj laid into men in general for their collective abuses of power in a tweet that epitomized a lot of the problems being addressed by #MeToo and #TimesUp.

“Having men treat you like dog shit because they’re famous or have money is the new era we live in. Word to the gram. Arguing w|other women while defending your abuser is the new era. Word to the gram. #Queen 8|10|18," she wrote.

Finally, the singer turned her real talk to her current relationship, in which she describes a partner who wants to get her to settle down and have kids, even though she knows that's not what's right for her right now.

“New boy asked if I could have his baby in a year & a half. On God I said: 'ain’t pushin out his babies til he buy da rock,'" she wrote. "Then I busted out laughing. He said: 'I’ll put a ring on it. I’ll do anything it takes.' Yet all I could think of his how much I love my new found freedom."

Facebook wants to make your dating life better! If you’re single like me, your first thought is probably "yay, Tinder sucks" followed immediately by WTF does that actually mean. Let’s break it down.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg took the stage at F8, a Facebook developers conference, to announce that there will now be a dating layer added to the mobile app. The social network creator shared that the 2.2 billion monthly active Facebook users will have the option to opt-in for the feature. But this isn’t just another Tinder, "this is going to be for building real, long-term relationships—not just for hookups," says Zuckerberg.

But wait, does this mean my mom in Cali and aunts in Texas will see who I’m into? Not at all, according to the announcement. “We have designed this with privacy and safety in mind from the beginning. Your friends aren’t going to see your profile, and you’re only going to be suggested to people who are not your friends.”

The app itself was presented by Chris Cox, Facebook product chief, and looks a lot like the Tinder and Bumble apps you’re already swiping on. The dating app will integrate events and groups you are a part of to help create a more community-based dating experience. Cox also shared an “unlocking” feature that will let people within groups or events see your page, basically an I’m-single-and-ready-to-mingle option to up your odds of finding love.

That all sounds great, and pretty standard tbh, but the reason this dating app will beat the others is that it’s genuinely intended for single people. That’s right, all the cheaters will have to stay on Tinder. According to the announcement anyone with a relationship status of “in a relationship” or “married” can’t use the app because it isn’t for them. Bravo Facebook! I appreciate knowing this feature will weed out the Tristan Thompsons of the world.

Joanna Coles, married mother of two, who has never used an app to try to find a date herself, knows a thing or two about love and sex online. She was the editor-in-chief of both Marie Claire and Cosmopolitan, where she gained intimate knowledge of the thrills and horrors of being a 20-something single woman. And she spent the last couple of years researching and writing her new book, Love Rules: How to Find a Real Relationship in a Digital World. Recently, she and I sat down to have a candid conversation (one woman who has worked at both Marie Claire and Cosmopolitan to another) about when to pick up the phone, when to put it down, when to have sex, when not to, and when you might want to start thinking about joining an AmDram troupe.

Marie Claire: You call Love Rules “a diet book for dating” and you talk about “junk love” as being similar to “junk food.” We all know what junk food is—cookies, chips, cake. But what would you consider to be junk love?

Jonna Coles: Junk love are relationships in which you know you’re not getting the emotional nutrition that you need. You’re probably wasting emotional calories on people who aren’t giving you enough back. I think most people know when they’re in a toxic relationship—it requires an enormous amount of effort to keep it going and you don’t get what you want from it.

MC: Something you point out about this new digital age is that we spend so much time comparing ourselves to other people and not thinking about what would really make us happy. What if, though, you're single and your feeds are blowing up with friends getting married and having babies, and you really, truly do think that that would make you happy?

JC: It is extremely frustrating if you are in your 20s and you want to embark on having a family, and you're struggling to meet people. And the solution would seem to be this amazing arrival of all these dating apps, which promise you connections with all sorts of people that you might not have in your daily life. You might work in an office like we do, which is primarily women, so there are no prospects there. Or you might have very limited free time. A dating app offers you more options.

What offers you the most options is having the biggest life you possibly can. So you think of the enormous fun of being on a sports team. You think of the hilarity of being involved in amateur dramatics and joining a theater group, right? What’s fun is the teamwork and doing something with your talents. These real-life relationships lead to meeting families, meeting friends. I worry that people spend so much time on their devices that they become voyeurs and spectators of other people’s lives and they’re not participating in their own. And that is a shame.

MC: We tell women to take a night off for themselves, indulge in self-care, but so often that means sitting on the couch, scrolling through Instagram.

JC: At the end of that evening you don’t feel better about yourself. You feel listless and disconnected from people. People are isolated with their devices. They in theory connect you, but actually what really connects you is experiencing things with people. I think an evening in on your own, thinking about yourself is depressing. I mean if you’re tired, go to bed early. Sleep is really important for you; I’m all for that.

DM: In the book you ask women to take a hard look at themselves, journal, accept responsibility for their past patterns.

JC: This is about self-knowledge and being honest about what you feel. We talk endlessly about the importance of data and data analytics. Well why not collect the data on your own behavior? Give yourself six months when you write every other night or three times a week about what you're feeling: When do you feel happiest? When do you feel most miserable? Start tracking it and look for patterns. If you go on a date and it goes well, do you feel the urgency to go back with him? Do you have to have sex with him that night? If you do, fair enough, but at least know that and then track how you feel after. Do you feel fantastic afterwards? Or do you feel like, ugh I wish I'd waited?

DM: On the flip side of that, we're in a cultural moment that says, “You’re perfect exactly the way you are!” Self-improvement or self-help can be seen as blame-y. How do we reconcile these two things: taking responsibility for past patterns and self-acceptance?

JC: You have to ask yourself, what would it be like to date you? How do you actually come across? If you like the answers and you’re still convinced it’s everybody else’s fault and not yours, well, that’s your point of view. But I think that pretty much everybody can do with working on themselves a little bit. The key thing is to be honest with yourself—hard, since most people have spent years hiding from themselves.

MC: There was a piece of advice I really loved (as someone who likes to talk on the phone, but I know most people don’t): Before going on a date with someone from a dating app, call him. What’s your take on millennials’ and gen z’s aversion to phone calls, and how can they get past that?

JC: People avoid the telephone because it’s easier to text. Calls can be awkward—you interrupt each other, you can’t quite hear someone. But the advantage is you get to hear someone else’s voice. You find out whether or not you can have a fluid conversation or if it’s stilted and peculiar. You can tell if someone is smart, if they’re dozy. Whether or not they’re a show-off. It’s important to know those things before you go and meet someone in the flesh because ultimately your time is at stake here.

The idea that you can have a relationship with someone online, and that this the equivalent of having a relationship with someone in the flesh, it’s just not true. I worry that women and men waste an inordinate amount of time having flirty, fun text exchanges with strangers—200, 300, 800, 2,000 texts before committing to meet them. It’s actually not that difficult to communicate with great speed and wit online. It’s much harder to do it in the flesh.

MC: You've said there are actually four people on that date—you've both put forward this internet persona, but then you meet in person and you’re who you actually are, and you have to deal with the gaps between those people.

JC: When you meet someone, all five senses are in play. There’s chemistry, there’s pheromones, eye contact, physical contact. You get none of those signals when you’re online.

MC: I love that you brought up time. Before I met my current partner, I always had a rule that I would give everyone a second date. And you seem to be a proponent of that, as well. But at what point do you say, “I’m giving this person more chances,” versus “I’m cutting my losses because I don’t want to waste my time?”

JC: It depends how you leave the first date and it depends what else you have going on. If you’ve got five other people that you’re looking forward to meeting or you’re simmering two people on the back-burner and this new person isn’t worth simmering, then there’s not necessarily a point in going to the second date.

People go online hunting for “the one” and the pressure on the first date is immense. But the chances of falling in love the minute you meet someone are really slim. Actually how most people meet is they went to school together, they’ve worked together, they’re friends of friends, and you start falling in love with people that you’ve done things with. So the point of getting to the second date is: Do you think that he or she could become a friend and would it be worth including them in your wider social network? That's more useful and more practical than if you think about it in terms of Could he be engagement potential?

MC: I think we’ve all watched The Bachelor for too long and we’re like, if I’m not in love with him by the third time we’ve hung out, then it must not be right.

JC: I was glued to the first season of Married at First Sight, I found it absolutely riveting. You can understand people’s feeling of someone just get me married because the trauma around dating is so intense.

MC: You write about how young women in college are getting drunk specifically so that they can have sex and then forget about it. Why is this happening?

JC: I think women crave intimacy, crave relationships, crave love, as do men. (This isn’t just women.) And I think they think that sex is the price they have to pay.

Listen, it’s fun to go to bed with people, it’s fun to get naked with people. Though I do think that there’s much too much drunk sex going on.

None of this is a problem if you really want to have drunk sex with a stranger. But for the most part, drunk sex with a stranger is not fun. And it’s really not fun to wake up in someone’s bed, uncertain of whether or not you’ve been sexually assaulted. I absolutely am not saying, “you shouldn’t drink.” But it’s not good to drink a lot of alcohol with strangers. And it’s good to see if you can have sex with this person sober.

MC: That’s something we used to hear in discussions with Cosmo readers: “Oh you got to the sober sex phase,” like that was a stage of your relationship that showed a greater level of commitment.

JC: If you meet someone online, a lot of the relationship has sort of been fast-forwarded. So you’ve already gotten to the place where you’re like, oh we find each other attractive. But the only reason you found each other attractive was because you either read a profile or you saw a picture of each other. And then you’re suddenly in this environment where you’re supposed to find each other attractive and you’re supposed to end up having sex that evening. And that’s a very, very speedy, very artificial way to get to know someone. One of my concerns—and you know this from working at Cosmo—is that we heard from a lot of women who weren’t enjoying sex. So they were either having it drunk or…

MC: Or they weren’t communicating about what they wanted with their partner, maybe because they’d only ever talked via text message.

JC: Right. And the more time you spend communicating online, the harder communicating in real life is. You get out of practice of having hard conversations about feelings, which, in theory, actually should be fun conversations.

MC: I remember after the Babe.net story about Aziz Ansari that came out earlier this year, so many people were saying, "Well why didn’t she just leave sooner?" or "Why didn’t she just say 'no?'" I think that that neglects the way that society and pop culture have conditioned women to believe that they owe men sex because they’ve gone a date with him, particularly if they’ve gone back to his apartment.

JC: There's an urgency in the culture we live in, and it’s okay to sometimes slow things down. If the woman in that story had said to him at the end of the dinner, "That was fantastic, I can’t wait to see you again," she could have completely ghosted him or she might have still liked him and she could have gone out with him again. The pressure to go back to people’s apartments after just having dinner with him...women need to know that it’s okay to resist the urgency to go home with someone.

I worry that spending a lot of time online strips people of agency in real life. We are so accustomed to being spectators that we almost no longer feel empowered to step up and participate in our own lives.

Earlier this year, 27-year-old entrepreneur Michael Bruch started Sweet Pea, a dating app that aims to improve how we communicate with one another. If you are reading this on a smartphone, you may be rolling your eyes: There are, precisely, three hundred dating apps out there—all of which claim to have the same goal. But Sweet Pea, which soft-launched five months ago and officially goes live this month, is different. For one, there’s a much bigger focus on conversation. Profiles are detailed and extensive, users can browse for matches by searching hashtags pertaining to their interests or topics of conversation, and then there's the app's signature: an "icebreaker" question users add to their profiles, giving potential matches an easy way to strike up a discussion (sans the boring "Hey, whats up?" messages common on what feels like every other dating app).

Ahead of Sweet Pea’s upcoming launch, we sat down with founder and CEO Michael Bruch to talk about dating in the digital age, what the online dating space is missing, and the many (many) steps he’s taken to build a better dating app.

What makes Sweet Pea different from other dating apps?

Michael Bruch: When you first sign up, every user is asked to create an icebreaker question for your profile. It could be whatever you’re thinking about at the time, or any topic of conversation. The icebreakers help people find some sort of common point of interest and begin a conversation. You can also upload videos, create stories and statuses, and tag activities or locations, which you can use to search for matches. We’ve created all these different ways to find people to relate to and start a conversation with.

Was this something you’d always wanted to do?

MB: No. When I graduated from New York University, I didn’t know what I wanted to do. My dad is a lawyer and has his own practice in D.C., so I went to work for him as a paralegal. I did that for about a year and decided that I hated it—it just wasn’t me. Meanwhile, while I was working there, I started building my first app, called Willow. It was a more extreme version of what Sweet Pea is now.

The idea was to create an app where people aren’t meeting each other because of how they look, but because of what they have to say. There were no photos, just an icebreaker question and a short profile. I didn’t really know how it was going to go, but ELLE wrote an article about us and we got 10,000 users in the space of a week. Eventually, we had around 300,000 users, but there was something about the format that required a little bit too much patience from people. So from there, we started researching and building Sweet Pea.

Why a dating app, though? There are so many out there already.

MB: About six years ago, I began having this feeling that there were going to be a lot of adverse consequences in terms of how social media platforms affect us socially. So I’ve had this “North Star” idea guiding me: How can you use social media as a way to bring strangers closer through conversation? I wanted to make it feel more human and nuanced, and less transactional than other platforms like Tinder or LinkedIn.

Recently, one of the early executives of Facebook, Chamath Palihapitiya gave a talk where he admitted that he doesn’t want his children using Facebook or Instagram. They were created with good intentions, but they’ve had all these ill consequences for society and civil discourse. A lot of people reacted to it—and kind of related to it. I don’t know if the answer is creating new platforms, or working within the old ones, but I figured I may as well give it a shot.

What did you find in your research while building Sweet Pea?

MB: I asked a thousand different people about their experiences using dating apps. There's an analogy about a crappy dive you go to in college: “I don’t even like this bar, but everybody else is here, so fine, I guess I’ll go.” That kind of seemed to be the consensus around a lot of these apps. People felt like, “Okay, a lot of people are on them, so I will use them to meet new people, but it doesn’t necessarily feel ideal.”

I’d ask: “How many matches turn into conversation?” And people would say, “Oh, one in every fifteen.” So I'm trying to solve that with a tangible product and make the app experience feel a little bit better.

How did your personal experience with dating apps or social media inform the development of Sweet Pea?

MB: Most of my inspiration has come from what I’ve experienced in real life and what wasn’t translating into digital spaces. Like that spark you feel when you just click with someone and have a really great conversation—it could be something serious, or something silly. It’s really hard, on most dating apps, to feel that.

A lot of people use apps as more of a casual game than really wanting to have a conversation and meet someone. And I don’t think that’s because people don’t want to have conversations and meet people; I think it's just what the environments ask of us, or allow for, when you’re just swiping really really fast. So, my goal was trying to recreate that “spark” digitally.

What do you hope users get out of Sweet Pea?

I want to help people find healthy, happy relationships and make the world feel like a little bit smaller of a place. People are getting worse at just having conversations with strangers. It’s not just a problem with dating apps, it’s social media in general that hasn't done a good job at helping us empathize with strangers. It's very conceivable that Gen-Z'ers are going to go on their first date through dating apps and learn about romance, companionship, courtship through dating apps. So, the idea is about helping people relate to each other better.

You plan to donate a portion of profits to charity.

MB: Unhealthy relationships are one of the biggest and most overlooked problems in this country, from a funding perspective. We plan to donate 10% of profits to charities focusing on issues like domestic violence and dating violence. I don’t want to come across as that like, woke white male feminist, because that’s not the case at all. I just want to do my part.

What do you hope to see in the app’s future?

MB: Broadly, of course, I’d love to be the app that everybody wants to use to meet someone new. I don’t have the money that other apps like Tinder and Bumble do to spend on marketing, so I can’t really compete in that way right now. But what I can do is build a better app. I can build a product that I think will be a much better experience for users. I’d like to be the app that people think of when they say, “I don’t really want to hook up, I want something a little more substantive.” I mean, I’m not here to tell people not to hook up, but if that's not something you want to do, the options are pretty limited. I want to change that.

I once passed the better part of a summer waiting for a spark to ignite with a guy whose feelings for me were mostly inscrutable, while mine never warmed above tepid. We got along well enough, were amply able to sustain a conversation, but ultimately, both of us understood that we were taxiing down an endless runway without any possibility of takeoff.

So when the subtle shifts in conversational dynamics occurred—increasingly extended pauses between texts, outlines of weekend plans left to languish as Friday loomed—I (correctly) assumed imminent ghosting. And while I found that style of exit both rude and frustrating, when things did fizzle for good, it seemed like the right and natural end.

Except that it wasn’t the end, not quite. Roughly two months after my final unanswered text, I opened my phone to a series of dispatches from my ghost, making small talk about Netflix as if it had been a week since we’d spoken. Confused and genuinely curious, I inquired after his endgame: Was he angling for me to come over, or was he just making conversation?

The latter, he said, before sinking back into a silence that lasted four more months. One random spring morning, I awoke to a late-night invitation to join him and a friend at a bar down the street from my apartment. Over the next couple of weeks, he fired off a few more variations on “u up?” until I eventually answered, explaining that I was seeing someone but wished him well. No response. His periscope dropped down below the waves, never to resurface again. At least not so far.

In 2016, I referred to this episode ghosting, but the internet recently furnished a more precise term: submarining, or the sudden vanishing of a romantic prospect who just as suddenly reappears at some future date, cresting huge and unannounced and without mention of the intervening silence, as if they’d never disappeared at all. Submarining is just the latest in a series of freshly spawned dating “trends:” There’s breadcrumbing, or maintaining a person’s interest by occasionally throwing them communication scraps that suggest some kind of intention; there’s stashing, or deliberately cloistering a new partner away from friends, family, and social media, as a means of keeping the relationship informal and non-exclusive; there’s cushioning, or the low-key lining up of several alternative partners as a sort of insurance against the dissolution of a new relationship.

The unifying themes, as I see them, include disregard for the feelings of others and a certain dismissiveness. Neither are new in the dating game—they’re not so much “trends” as perennially shitty dating practices. The lighthearted designations may help them seem less egregious, but pet names just normalize the behavior so it becomes easier to indulge, more socially acceptable. If everyone ghosts each other all the time, then we don't have to hold ourselves too accountable to other people’s feelings. They know the rules.

These phenomena are inextricably linked with the fact that so many of us are dating via apps. According to Paulette Sherman, Psy. D., psychologist and author of Dating from the Inside Out, Tinder and its ilk are making people “lazier and maybe more rude.”

“Personally I feel like we’ve lost something, in terms of our manners, in terms of taking more time and effort to get to know a person, and I think part of that is because of the overload of the dating sites,” she says.

“I’m sure that in the past, before dating sites were popular, romantic prospects stood people up, they led them on—like breadcrumbing—and they’d maybe, possibly disappear,” she continues. “But I think that was harder to do when they’d met at a place they’re going to see each other again, either in a small town, at church, in college, a fix-up. It’s a lot more uncomfortable that way.” Technology, however, affords impunity.

Most people prefer not to break bad news in person—according to a 2013 Pew Research Center report, even before Tinder became ubiquitous, one in six Americans had dumped a partner over text, email, or online message—and if you asked any octogenarian about their dating days, many would be able to dredge up some stories about heartbreak and romantic fuckery. But Tinder feels extra impersonal, like shopping for humans. I suspect that scrolling through endless faces primes us to understand our matches as images on a screen rather than real people, opening the door to emotional negligence.

Gail Grace, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist in New York City, agrees that bottomless romantic options probably means more ghosting, more submarining. The legitimate desire for human connection, she says, hasn’t changed, but dating apps make it harder to shake the feeling that the perfect person may be just another swipe away—and potentially harder to focus on whoever’s in front of you.

“Anything worthwhile takes time: if you’re going to go to get your Ph.D. that’s going to take time. If you’re going to train for a marathon, that takes time,” Grace says. “It takes time to get to know people.” Thanks to social media, it’s never been easier to peer into a person’s personal life and jump to conclusions about who they are, moving more quickly onto the next.

There is an upside in having latitude to make quick, decisive calls as red flags arise, though. Sherman and Grace both agree that apps like Tinder can be wonderful tools for introducing people who would never have met otherwise. Still, daters these days are overwhelmed with choice.

Moira Weigel, author of Labor of Love: The Invention of Dating, warns against romanticizing previous generations’ courtship practices. Dating has long had a way of bringing out the worst in people.

“We’re all very familiar with the conversation that goes, ‘Oh dating is terrible, it used to be good and now it’s bad,’” Weigel says. “Try being a gay man in the 50s; try being an interracial couple; try being a divorced woman.” That nostalgia is often wrong.

“Everyone has always complained about dating,” she adds, nodding to the agony aunt columns (anonymous, advice-seeking Dear Abby letters) of yore that detailed evergreen complaints from women who’d had it up to their spit curls with the cads of the day. Although technology has exacerbated people’s negative tendencies, dating shorthand, Weigel says, is as old as media.

Consider the “The Fusser,” a sort of old-timey fuckboy Weigel defined as “a playboy-ish college man who’s going on dates with everyone” in the 1920s. She also pointed to the cast of “types” outlined in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s debut novel, This Side of Paradise, published in 1920: the “slicker,” the sharply dressed, slick-haired cool guy; the “Popular Daughter,” or P.D., invariably engaged to a rotating carousel of tycoon heirs; the “belle,” perpetually encircled by eager suitors; the “flirt”; the “baby vamp.” All of these entrenched themselves in popular culture, media coining terms the public then mimicked.

Social media takes it one step further, Weigel explains, algorithmically herding us into groups of people with whom we have interests in common: You and your friends probably inhabit the same online spaces, which means the internet probably pushes you toward the same types of guys. A pool of your thought peers probably includes people who have encountered the same “particular kinds of creatures” in the wild, and so you develop a common language to describe them. While it’s possible that assigning pet names to bad behaviors might make them feel more common and less abjectly rude, there’s also something unifying and joyful in crafting hashtaggable labels—especially for women.

“These terms usually are critical of straight male behavior,” Weigel notes. “Certainly, they involve a lot of heartache and unpleasant experiences, too, but part of the fun is making a name for it, and part of the function of all of these terms is also to consolidate a certain female online community,” she adds.

Women online are writing a new vocabulary for the nonsense men pull. They’re publicly calling it out, rather than anonymously raging about in a Dear Abby letter. If there’s anything generational in millennial dating trends, maybe it’s a shift toward women’s agency. And if that is the case, then count me ready for the next one.

This summer, just two days after my divorce, I left for a 10-week solo trip through Europe, visiting 11 countries and dating in most of them.

My ex and I eloped to Hawaii when we were 25. But shortly after we started arguing more, and with more intensity. Despite counseling, neither of us was happy, so I moved back in with my family. That was last winter.

By summer, I was feeling like myself again, but I was falling for a guy I met on Tinder. Will* was a passionate, outgoing PhD student who wasn’t looking for commitment and who was leaving for a summer internship across the country.

So at 26, single for the first time in my adult life, I decided to spend the summer traveling. And dating men abroad.

In mid-June, I landed in Edinburgh and started swiping. I matched with Nicholas* on Bumble, who was 29 and a pianist. We met for cider and he took me to a jazz bar. He said he "liked foreign girls," but it never worked out because they eventually went home. Ok buddy.

On my last day, we hiked to the top of Arthur’s Seat, a hill overlooking the city. I asked for his opinion about Will from home. Probably not normal first date behavior, but this wasn't a normal first date.

Will and I had an instant connection; we’d lie on the couch talking for hours and text daily. I couldn’t get enough of him, and it seemed like he felt the same way.

But when he left for the summer, I asked if he’d want to keep seeing each other in the fall. He responded: “The fall is a long way away, but I can’t immediately think of a reason I wouldn’t want to hang out again.” Ouch.

Nicholas said Will sounded like a prolific dater who’s been moving through girls for years — and that I was too sensitive for quick, casual dating. He might be right about Will, but I didn’t agree with his assessment of me; I’ve dated other guys before and since Will, and I haven’t cared about anyone else.

Portugal

I was in the city of Faro in the Algarve Region for one night and not expecting any dates. But on Tinder, a guy named João invited me for a motorcycle ride and coffee by the beach; we had a lot in common, and being with him felt easy.

After sunset, we went back to the city and hung out on the roof of my Airbnb apartment — until we got chased off by my host, who was furious I’d brought a strange man there (oops). Instead, we drove to his beach house and had sex for hours. (And, I learned that, in Portugal, they call spooning the “shell position.”)

We stayed in bed, playing guitar and singing until 6 A.M.

I was sad to leave João, but I couldn’t stop smiling. Those were the kinds of experiences I was hoping to have, and I thought about how much my life has changed over the past year, for the better. I felt happier and more like myself than I had in a long time.

Spain

In hot, bustling Seville, I rented a studio apartment for a month.

I texted Will a picture of the view from my terrace and asked if he knew where I was — he guessed right. He said his internship was busy but good, and that he was enjoying Seattle. No sign that he was thinking about me as much as I was about him.

There wasn’t much activity on Bumble, but on Tinder I met Pablo*, a biologist from northern Spain with a beard and ponytail and sexy accent. He took me to a hidden “secret bar” for tinto verano (chilled red wine with lemon-lime soda) and vino de pasas (raisin wine) — both were surprisingly good.

That weekend, we went to a music festival with his friends and danced to DJs and bands. His friends were nice, but didn’t really English, and he made little effort to include me in their conversations. His friends seemed more willing to help me translate in restaurants than Pablo, who seemed more interested in flirting with the scantily-clad girl sitting next to him. He couldn’t even help me order lunch, when he was the only one who spoke both languages fluently? I was fed up.

My last week in Seville I dated Mario*, who was half Italian and half Spanish. He took me to a rooftop bar with a view of Seville Cathedral and said he’d bring me to the airport Monday morning when I flew to Paris.

Sunday, I texted him. He said he was stuck in Malaga, hours away. Pissed he couldn’t bother to give me a heads up, I looked up taxi companies and scheduled a pick-up.

I was starting to realize I shouldn’t count on men who know they’ll never see me again to keep their word. But, I was still enjoying traveling overall and spending my days sightseeing. And I was optimistic I’d meet more guys like João.

France

I met Max*, a 28-year-old British Student (a Tinder match), for lunch. The very first thing I noticed was that he not as attractive as his photos. But he was friendly, and we had fish and chips, then café-hopped and each bought rounds of drinks.

By dinner, I was out of cash (and the restaurant was cash-only); we agreed to find an ATM, but after a few rounds of drinks I forgot and he didn’t mention it, either.

The next day, he texted, asking if I was free for coffee. I wasn’t interested and didn’t respond.

“We never settled the bill from dinner! And I can’t afford the 22 quid,” he texted. At first, I was confused, until I remembered he paid the bill. He then asked me to PayPal him the money from my half; I didn’t respond. Funny how he only wanted the money after he knew I wasn’t interested. He kept texting, so I blocked him.

A few days later, he found me on Facebook and sent me a message: “Is there something wrong with you, or are you just a c*nt? Hahahaha.” I blocked him again, and started to wonder if the mix of good dates was worth the risk of bad ones.

I was in a terrible mood until that night, when I got a notification Will added me on Snapchat. We’d been texting every week or so, but this was an exciting development. Still, I tried not to read into it too much.

Germany

In Munich, I met Maddin* (from Bumble) near the Isar River. We sat in the grass and watched people wade in. He was 33 and chiseled. We sat with our feet in the water and he moved closer to me and kissed me. He said he had to leave for a wedding in his hometown that evening, but that he had a few hours, and asked if I wanted to go home with him.

Just as I expected, his apartment was huge and sleek and expensive-looking. And he was amazing in bed.

After, we talked about the wildest places we’ve had sex, our past relationships, regrets, and the future. It was deep and honest and refreshing. He said he’s never been in love and that he’s too picky, and that he finds one flaw and moves on (this seems to be a common pattern in today’s dating-app culture).

He said it was one of the nicest conversations he’d had with someone he just met. I smiled the whole walk back to my hotel, feeling revived and relaxed.

On Snapchat, Will sent me a message: “How’s the trip going? Where are you headed next?” It was clear he was excited for me. I’d noticed he’d been watching all my stories…

Denmark

I took an overnight bus to Copenhagen. At a seafood restaurant near the city center, one of the waiters smiled every time he walked past, and I smiled back. I heard him talking to my waitress (in Danish), and shortly after, he took over as my waiter. He asked about my trip and was confident, smooth, and flirty.

After dinner, he made me a cappuccino from the restaurant next door and got my number, then we went out for champagne. He said he was surprised I didn’t mind eating alone, “looking like I got stood up.” I told him people can think what they want, it makes no difference to me. Suddenly, I realized this is one of the few times I’ve really meant this.

I also realized until now, I never thought I’d go to a restaurant by myself. Or a bar. Or a club. Now, I’ve done all those things, and they weren’t as scary as they seemed. And the initial anxiety I felt about navigating new places disappeared once I realized it was easy – there are English-speakers everywhere, offline maps with directions and translation apps. And if you miss a train or flight, there’s always another.

End of summer

When I got back, it was September and I moved into my first solo apartment. The idea of living alone used to intimidate me; I thought I’d be lonely, or bored, or that a crisis would come up that I couldn’t deal with. But these last few months have made me feel more comfortable relying on myself.

I still don’t know what will happen with Will, but we’re seeing each other again. He asked me to come over his first night back in town, and it felt like we picked up right where we left off. We spent the whole night cuddling and telling each other about our summers, and have been seeing each other in the weeks since.

I think you can learn from every person and every relationship, no matter how brief (or awkward). I’m building a better picture of what I want in a partner, but I’m also learning that I don’t need one to be happy.

*Name has been changed.

Follow Elise on Twitter.

I was rooting for the second date. I really wanted it to be fun. On paper, this new guy and I had a standout first go-round: plenty to talk about, lots of shared laughs. We commiserated about Trump and he boasted about being raised by a throng of strong women. He even planned our second date halfway through, picking up tickets for a film we both wanted to see. But he'd also tried to kiss me goodnight after I'd pulled away and then lingered on my stoop, asking if I was sure he couldn't come up. As our movie date approached, I felt a squeeze of something unpleasant whenever I pictured his handsome face.

Still, I pushed it aside, because lord knows enough people have told me I'm too picky: 31 and single and expecting the moon and stars. "I always had a three-date rule," married people tell me, smugly, like every man blossoms into Prince Charming given enough time.

When I got to the cinema, he was already in line; as we chatted, he stood too close to me and I kept smashing into the people behind me.

The second we sat down in the theater, he leaned over to kiss me, lingering. I laughed and offered him my cheek. At the end of the show, he went in again; I made a joke and pulled my face away. We'd agreed beforehand to get a drink after the show, but as soon as we walked outside, he asked if I wanted to go to his apartment. I declined but continued with the plan to find a bar. I've been conditioned to think it's impolite to steer away from the agreed-upon path.

"Do you go on a lot of online dates?" he asked. I could tell there would be no third date, so I set myself up for an out later: "You know, not so much right now...honestly, I have so much going on it's a little bit hard to make dating a priority."

At the bar, I turned down a second drink, called myself a car, gave him a hug and said a casual, "Well, thanks again for the movie, this was fun." Then I turned my attention to my phone, willing the Lyft driver to step on it. Undeterred, my date moved in close and kissed me.

"You really just go for it, don't you!" I said lightly, pulling away. Because this is how I've been trained: For the sake of personal safety, rejection is best served with a smile.

He shrugged. "Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?" he asked. I demurred. He pressed on: "It's perfect 'cause you're about to go out of town, I could give you something to remember!" I kept smiling as I shook my head: "I'm sure, I just gotta get home!"

When our two separate Lyfts pulled up, I practically leaped into the one in front. Then I got this:

I gave him the too-busy line. Everyone knows it's a polite pass, right? I wouldn't have had trouble making room in my life for someone I genuinely liked, but after two dates and no sex, letting a guy down with his ego intact seemed easiest on everybody.

I put my phone down and chalked it up to yet another Super Sad True NYC story: two strangers briefly pausing together in the dark.

Then, from the kitchen table, my phone buzzed again.

I ran screenshots by a few trusted girlfriends. "Passive-aggressive," one friend noted. "The proper response is: 'Good luck with everything, take care.'" "It sounds like he was just commiserating about the dating scene?" suggested another, optimistically. Once I pointed it out, everyone agreed it was pretty rude to imply our two dates had been a "giant waste of time." But people say things without intending malice, and hey, why not assume the best?

Bizarrely, he sent one more text hours later, as I was turning my phone off for the night:

I lay in bed going over the tiny story arc of our relationship in my mind, stewing instead of sleeping, growing angrier and angrier as I went over the details of that night.

After all his unreciprocated moves, he had the audacity to text that he's "become better at picking up signals." Signals like me not letting him kiss me, not wanting another drink, and not spending the night? I lay there awake, angry with myself, too: I'd stroked his ego because I didn't feel like dealing with someone potentially calling me a c*nt. "We're in the age of desensitization!" Yeah, bruh, maybe you're desensitized to someone expressing repeatedly that she does not want to have sex with you.

I emailed a few friends for advice the next morning, and their responses snapped things into focus. My boldest friend said this: "If you feel comfortable sending a message, I say go for it. Otherwise, who is going to call this guy on his shit?"

Before I could think about it too long, I did just that:

Then I blocked him.

It was only after I hit send that I remembered the dating app on which we'd met shows your first and last name after you connect—so with the help of Google, he'd have myriad means of contacting me if he so desired.

But I had a busy day of travel ahead of me, so I scurried off to the airport, heart pounding, arms pulsing with adrenaline.

When he'd tried—I'm assuming—to text back and didn't receive a response, he reached out via Facebook. (Even though, by blocking him, I'd put up another boundary—one he rushed to pole-vault over in multiple ways.) Because we aren't friends, I didn't see any of it until later, but it's clear at this point he was sure there'd just been some kind of misunderstanding:

A grand misunderstanding! My phone must not be getting his texts! He must've had a little too much to drink! (We'd each had three light beers and a meal over several hours, so nobody seemed drunk, but okay.) There's an apology there but also an accusation. Because it's heartlessness that led me to text that, right? I obviously pulled a fast one on him by not dropping my smile, adopting a stern voice, and saying, "Sir, your continued advances are making me uncomfortable." Never mind that that is something women have been trained not to do. Why? Because it gets them killed.

(I'm not being dramatic: Witness these 12 women killed for saying no. Or the 22-year-old man who, in 2014, vowed to "slaughter" the women who'd rejected him before going on a shooting rampage in Santa Barbara. "Women killed for rejecting men" is an autofill on Google.)

This came next:

In the cab to the airport, I rejected a call from an unknown number; I Googled it, and sure enough, it was his work number.

Shortly after, I opened Instagram to find this:

Another hour or so passed, and as I was waiting in the terminal, busily answering work emails, a message came through to the address listed on my professional website with the subject line "Hear me out:"

Right. The only reason I could have sent that text is because I'm a mean, immature person who loves playing the victim and takes pleasure in hurting people. And I need a man to explain to me how I was wrong in stating that I felt uncomfortable. This is just how people date, it was just a cheek kiss and a polite inquiry. Really, I'm such a liar. Like all the women who say Trump assaulted them. Like all the women who couldn't get Cosby convicted.

For what it's worth, I didn't think this guy was going to rape (or kill) me. I never worried that he'd force his way into my building or push me against the cab until I let him join me in the backseat. That's not the point. And that's not what I meant when I invoked rape culture. You do not have to rape anyone to contribute to rape culture.

I shut off my phone and tried to push his defensive tirade out of my mind during my flight. But when I turned it back on another email was in my inbox:

The Five Love Languages is a book about how people in committed, consenting relationships can better express their love. Is his interpretation that if physical touch is your love language, you can get handsy with whomever you please? And let's not miss that he thinks I'm being unloving by stating that I felt uncomfortable. "She has tremendous hate in her heart." It rings a bell, right?

I spent the day with my stomach in knots. And I'm feeling them again, writing this. But I'm not sharing this tale to shame one ill-informed guy. My hope is that people will see this and get a peephole view into the female experience—one where your interest in a man is irrelevant, where being nice as a survival mechanism is leading someone on, and where stating that you feel uncomfortable is a slanderous lie.

My date never lost his temper, never called me a bitch or a c*nt or a whore. He's a smart guy, and attractive, and cool, and certainly, in his own mind, entirely woke. But guys, smiling as you continue to pressure your way into someone's pants is not respectful. And then turning defensive when you're called out? Not woke.

There are hundreds of ways I exhibit racism and ageism and ableism and sexism without realizing it, and of course I'm tempted to grow defensive when called on it. What's more, I'm certainly not convinced I did everything right. I shouldn't have let him kiss me on that dark street corner, I think, playing the mental tapes back weeks later. Maybe I shouldn't have been so nice in my initial blowoff text. Maybe I should have engaged in a dialogue about rape culture. Maybe I shouldn't have been afraid to call him out.

But at the end of the day, his response was disturbing. Even worse, I know that to women, this is just another story of a bad date.

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It's no longer weird (or worse, desperate!) for a single lady to dabble in online dating. In 2017, it's just another way to meet someone, as likely to succeed as meeting through friends or stumbling into a meet-cute at the coffee shop. But how normal is it, and how normal are your own app habits? Check the numbers here to see how the country is clicking.

Sources: 1 Bumble data; 2 Skyn Condoms survey; 3 Pew Research Center; 4 Research Now; 5 University of Chicago; 6 U.S. census; 7 WalletHub; 8 Western University in Ontario; 9 National Center for Biotechnology Information

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Last week I had the pleasure of attending a dating etiquette class at The Plaza. I've always been intrigued by manners—an ex-boyfriend's dad said I had "1950s values" after I wrote him a thank-you note, which...IDK either—and by the social mores of courtship. As many 20somethings will attest, dating can be a very demoralizing experience, so a class boasting the *right* way to do it had my curiosity piqued.

Founded and directed by Myka Meier, Beaumont Etiquette bills itself as a contemporary finishing program "based on Western etiquette," though the courses are intended to "reflect today's global society." The two-hour Art of Dating class I signed up for promised to focus on date prep, dining etiquette, conversation tips, body language reading, confidence development, and more. Oh, also cocktails, so = sold.

Two hours and two experts later, I had learned a lot. But please, take the do's and don'ts below with a grain of salt, because a) can anyone truly be an expert at "dating" and b) inspired by the great Justin Trudeau, "It's 20157," and you can sleep with someone whenever you damn want.

Body Language Is the Key to Making a Good First Impression

If you're at a bar charity function and you're trying to meet people, make sure you stand with your chin parallel to the floor, your shoulders back, and with good posture. Don't play with your phone, but rather, maintain eye contact—a novel idea—and lean in if you're enjoying the conversation.

If you like someone, you'll naturally look into their left eye. If you switch eye contact and begin to stare into their right eye, it means you aren't enjoying the conversation.

Don't Cross Your Legs at Your Knees

Apparently the proper way to cross your legs is at your ankles. Your knees and your ankles should be pressed together at all times.

Oh and while you're at it, don't cross your arms. It's hostile. Meier suggests carrying a clutch so you can hold it on your lap or in front of you if you like to have something to do with your hands.

Being Late Sucks for Everyone

Here's something new I learned: A "gentleman" would never let you think that you are late to a date. If, hypothetically, you showed up 20 minutes after you were supposed to, a gentleman should say, "No, I made the reservation too early." I like this piece of etiquette.

However, if your date shows up fashionably late, you are technically not supposed to make a big deal about it—"for the sake of the date," says Meier. Boo.

Google Yourself

According to Meier, 45% of the lovelorn Google their potential mate before a date. Get ahead of the awkwardness that would occur when your would-be boo discovers your old Tumblr and just delete that sh*t.

Spend Time Curating Your Online Identity

If you're on the apps, you know that someone's picture is the first thing you see. Celebrity matchmaker Amy Laurent—our relationship expert of the evening—encourages you to select 4-6 photos ("you don't need a whole album!") that make a statement about who you are. We're talking energy and variety. Make sure one of photos shows you doing something you love. One selfie at most, because apparently guys don't like selfies. [See above for note re: "grain of salt"]

Next, Laurent wants you to focus on your tagline. Say something fun and unique in a light, interesting way. Instead of writing, "Based in Manhattan, looking for love, love to travel," say: "Living in NYC, looking for a partner-in-crime to hit every item on our travel bucket list."

Conversational No-No's

Avoid the weather. Compliment people. No politics, no religion, no sex, no vices, and don't talk about money. [Writer's note: THIS SOUNDS SO BORING, THOUGH]

There's a Special Place on Your Plate for Olive Pits

The more you know, eh? So here's where Meier's formal etiquette training really begins to shine. I'll just go through this stuff at lightning speed because it's interesting even though it has zero impact on whether you land the love of your life.

If someone asks you a question and you have to chew for 15 seconds before you're ready to answer, you've taken too big a bite. Oh, and you're only supposed to take four bites of food MAX before setting your cutlery down and "resting." And I would get into the way you're supposed to hold your fork and knife, but it's complicated so this lady can show you.

Sauces go on the bottom right corner of your plate; discards, such as olive pits or stems, in the top left.

If your date gets something stuck in his or her tooth, you're supposed to let them know right away, rather than have him or her discover it hours later in the bathroom. Awkwardness. Be. Damned.

What to Do with Your Wallet

If you invited the body across the table from you, traditional etiquette says the check is on you. If you were invited to the shindig, it's still polite to *offer* to split the bill. But what does "offer" mean exactly? Meier says you can simply "reach" for your wallet when the bill arrives, but you don't need to verbally suggest you go Dutch. You should never offer to split the check if you can't actually afford it.

Sex

Both Laurent and Meier agree that proper etiquette rules you should wait until you are exclusive with someone before you sleep with them. Laurent thinks it takes at least eight dates before you really know someone, and that sex shouldn't even be on the table during the first month of going out. Do what you want with that intel, Emily Post-aspirants, but I think that rule is outdated.

Your Goal Should Not Be "How Do I Get This Person to Like Me?"

I wanted to end on some advice that I really like and believe in. Lots of the aforementioned etiquette ideas make my feminist insides churn—more tips and tricks to make women think *they're* doing something wrong out there on the dating scene? No. Fuck that. Never forget that you—you—have just as much autonomy as your wine bar Tinder date. And while sure, being charming is a good and fun goal, your date carries half the responsibility for making sure your meet-cute isn't a total disaster.

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You'd think that one of the first women to work at Facebook would have the whole online-dating thing down. But after an awkward date ended with a guy giving her his résumé, asking if she could pass it on to "Mark," she decided she was finished trying to meet men on her own. Not only was it mortifying that someone had feigned romantic interest in her in order to get a job interview...it was also the second time it had happened.

She went home, Googled "Palo Alto matchmakers," and wrote an e-mail to the first name that popped up: Amy Andersen.

Andersen recounts this date-gone-awry outside her office in the Allied Arts Guild, a sprawling Spanish-mission-style complex in Silicon Valley, with stone walls and terra-cotta tiles and a couple of courtyard fountains. The 40-year-old former Merrill Lynch financial adviser is part of a new generation of matchmakers, many in their 20s and 30s, repackaging a career that seemed dusty and a romance option that sounded like a last resort. For at fees that range from several hundred to tens of thousands of dollars, these would-be cupids offer a form of self-care for daters who've had it with Tinder.

Founded in 2003, Andersen's Linx Dating serves a select tier of tech-industry insiders. For $35,000 (yes, $35,000), Linx offers a "silver" package, which guarantees clients eight introductions over two years, with matches drawn from a database of about 850 active members. Upgrade to "platinum" for $10,000 more and you'll get 10 introductions plus a "romantic concierge" to plan your dates. To be considered VIP, membership starts at $100,000. For these Very Important Daters, Andersen conducts "intensive searches" beyond her database, "hunting" for prospects through social media networks, at fundraisers and galas, and on the nearby Stanford University quad.

[pullquote align='C']A study by Pew Research Center last February found that a third of people on dating apps never meet anyone in person.[/pullquote]

Linx clients occupy a curious position: They've earned enough tech dollars to take their love lives offline. ("No algorithms. No arrows. No apps. Just intuition," the website promises.) Most daters can't spend $35,000 to meet a potential match, and Andersen has only a handful of VIP clients. But the fact that the hefty price tags exist, and that there are people willing to pay up for her services, is a sign of a larger trend. Matchmaking has become an aspirational good. Today, there are a growing number of young people across the country exhausted by using a gajillion dating apps, and a new crop of matchmakers setting up shop to serve them.

It was app fatigue that drove Rachel, a real-life success story of Three Day Rule, the country's largest matchmaking database. The 32-year-old cosmetics company executive had been living in New York before she left in 2012 to attend business school. When she returned two years later, she found a dramatically different dating landscape. "Everyone was using all the apps all the time," she explains. "It was hard to navigate. You don't know what people want—a relationship, a one-night stand—and you can't really ask. It takes a lot of time and energy to meet people and sort it out." Matchmakers relieve some of the anxieties that dating apps create. For one thing, they make it clear that a date is a date. Nobody hires a matchmaker because he or she just wants a hookup; if you accept a date brokered by a matchmaker, you know that you are signing up for someone who at least wants the potential for a relationship. Matchmakers can also help smooth over misunderstandings that might otherwise lead people to "ghost," or disappear on, each other, if they'd met through, say, Hinge.

At one point, Rachel had problems on Bumble, The League, OkCupid, and, yes, Hinge. She came across Three Day Rule in a women's magazine or on a website—she can't remember. (The name, Three Day Rule CEO Talia Goldstein explains, was inspired by the film Swingers, in which guys waited three days to call a girl after meeting.) "It seemed like a way to help navigate this crazy world," Rachel says. "The matchmakers were people in my age range who would understand my situation." Rachel joined last summer. Six months later, she is still dating her first match.

[pullquote align='C']For $35,000 (yes, $35,000), Linx offers a "silver" package, which guarantees clients eight introductions over two years.[/pullquote]

"It's funny, because I think that we were on the same apps before but we never connected, and I don't know if I would have chosen him on a dating app," Rachel confesses. "I was a victim to swipe culture; I was being a little bit superficial about it, and the guy I'm dating now, he's really cute, but I don't think that was what I was looking for. But the more I got to know him, I was like, Oh, all right, I guess they knew what they were doing, because it seems to be working!"

Initially, Rachel felt ambivalent about using the service. It's not exactly the meet-cute story you can't wait to tell your friends at Saturday brunch. But now, happy with her relationship, she says, "At the end of the day, none of that stuff really matters."

These matchmakers are not like your pushy aunt or Yente in Fiddler on the Roof, the sort of matchmaker who calls friends and friends of friends to inquire about the avail- ability of their sons or daughters. Millennial matchmakers use Facebook and LinkedIn or Tinder and OkCupid to recruit thousands of members to their databases. Most got their start in New York, Los Angeles, or San Francisco, but many are expanding to San Diego, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Atlanta. In all of these places, it seems, there are more and more 20- and 30-somethings spending so many hours in the office that they want to outsource their love lives, just as they outsource everything else in the app era. And that demand creates an opportunity for a growing number of their peers to pursue what many might consider a dream job—making their own hours while being paid to talk and think about romance. (Yearly salaries for matchmakers in cities like New York and L.A. start at about $50,000; those running their own shop can make up to $125,000.)

But not just anyone can be a matchmaker. The job requires a special skill set, Three Day Rule's Goldstein explains. Partnered with Match.com, ChristianMingle, and JDate, the company currently has more than 20 full-time matchmakers, with 400 paying clients, and 75,000 singles in its database. "At the beginning, I thought I would hire these super-accomplished women who went to Harvard Business School," Goldstein recalls. "But I learned that what matters is not the pedigree; it's soft skills."

There are places where a would-be matchmaker can train. Like the Matchmaking Institute (MMI) in New York, the only state-licensed school that certifies matchmakers, which opened in 2003. During its first year, MMI had seven students. Last fall, it had more than 100, each paying $5,000 for a three-month course. Students learn how to help clients identify their goals and recognize their personality traits, as well as the traits that will complement them. While dating apps sort mates by categories like favorite books and bands, human matchmakers go deeper—how you feel about your family, whether you're an introvert or an extrovert, and your "attachment style" (see: secure, anxious/preoccupied, dismissive/avoidant, fearful/avoidant). Another strategy: the photos of your exes you've been meaning to delete. Matchmakers scrutinize pictures of all their clients' exes to try to figure out what attracts them. It's all about face shape, declares Goldstein. Even when someone's exes come from different ethnic back- grounds, they almost always have the same face shape, she says. After figuring out what this is, Three Day Rule matchmakers use facial-recognition software to screen their database for prospective matches for clients.

[pullquote align='C']there are more and more 20- and 30-somethings spending so many hours in the office that they want to outsource their love lives.[/pullquote]

That said, a lot comes down to a matchmaker's personality. Matchmakers must be outgoing enough to chat up strangers to add to the database but sensitive enough to handle clients' feelings of frustration or sadness. They must also be able to coax them out of rigid expectations.

Take, for example, Megan,* a 32-year-old startup investor in San Francisco who hired a matchmaker from Three Day Rule. Megan, in short, is a catch: She attended Harvard, has an MBA, and worked as an investment banker before becoming a venture capitalist. The biggest dating dilemma Megan faced, as she explained during her initial consultations, was that she intimidated the men she met on dating apps. (For the record, she's also 5'10" and beautiful.) Megan thought that only someone with the same educational pedigree would accept her professional ambition—someone with a diploma or advanced degree from a top school, who works at a top company, investment firm, consulting firm, law firm, hospital, or university. Her matchmaker had other, simpler ideas: Megan needed someone handsome and taller than she is.

So she introduced Megan to Mike, a man she'd approached at a bar when scouting for Megan and who worked at an energy company. Megan thought he was cute but that his education and career weren't "up to par." She feared that they were "on different intellectual levels"—and she had learned the hard way that men would not accept that.

Megan and her matchmaker hopped on the phone to talk through it. OK, so he went to a non-prestigious college. And he didn't make as much money as she did. But he had ambition. He was starting a new company, a project he was passionate about, on the side. Megan and Mike met at a wine bar in the Marina District neighborhood.

Six dates later, Megan found herself feeling more and more attached to Mike. He was "kind, thoughtful, a solid communicator, and not self-absorbed." He "got her" in ways she couldn't quite explain. It turns out, despite what she'd been look- ing for, she didn't need a clone of herself. A more laid-back man offered balance rather than competition. One year later, Megan and Mike are still together.

Think of the Millennial-era matchmaker as a sort of professional wing-woman. Francesca Hogi, 42, a bicoasdern tal matchmaker and dating coach, describes it as helping her clients make choices.

A 2014 New York Times article reported that Tinder users spend up to 90 minutes per day swiping. Yet a study by Pew Research Center last February found that a third of people on dating apps never meet anyone in person. "People have lost the ability to make choices," says Hogi, who encourages her clients to narrow their focus to a few options.

Amy Van Doran, the 31-year-old founder of Modern Love Club (a "high-touch, curated" matchmaking business in New York focused on "creatives"), points out another aspect of the problem. Dating apps, Van Doran says, encourage people—especially straight men—to treat dating like a video game: "Every guy is trying to date up a video game level. But they're above what they can net." Unrealistic expectations create a negative-feedback loop that ends in disappointment and disengagement. "Instead of figuring out what they need to work on, they're saying that dating apps suck and you can't date in New York," she says.

[pullquote align='C']Dating apps encourage people—especially straight men—to treat dating like a video game.[/pullquote]

The matchmaker's mission is to help clients slow down. "Everyone is always looking for what I call the BBD—a bigger, better deal," Andersen says. "Even when I meet with them, I slow down my speech, to start to have that hopefully seismic shift in their mental space." Andersen encourages her clients to avoid Googling or Facebook- stalking each other, to put off sex, and, unless a date goes horribly, to go out with anyone she introduces them to at least twice.

Flexibility is key. "Clients get three deal-breakers—that's it!" Van Doran says. "They can't be like, 'He has to be 6' tall and have brown hair and be Jewish and make more than $500,000 a year.'" The dance between the matchmaker and the recruit is delicate. The matchmaker often ends up doing things that seem like flirting or even dating on behalf of her client. There is also a fundamental inequality between clients and matches. The reality: Someone who's paying thousands or tens of thousands of dollars is usually meeting someone who's there for free or for not much. Frankie Bashan, a San Francisco–based matchmaker for lesbians and bisexual women, charges "recruits" $250 to be in her database to create a sense that they, too, have "skin in the game." For matchmakers working for straight clients, it's a struggle to keep a balanced gender ratio; they tend to receive more client requests from women than men.

Dating is a numbers game, and clients are hiring matchmakers to increase their odds by increasing their number of possibilities. This is where matchmakers really earn their fees. Jasmine Diaz, an L.A.-based matchmaker who works primarily with African-American professionals, has gone so far as to set up interstate searches for clients in Charlotte, North Carolina, and Oklahoma City. One woman, a 28- year-old doctor who lives in L.A., found Diaz through a friend. "I thought if I knew someone like a matchmaker, I could meet someone I could feel comfortable with, where I wouldn't have to worry: Who am I really talking to?" she says. "You hear a lot of stories about apps, and you think, What are the odds that I'm one of the good stories?" That, and she doesn't have time to waste endlessly scrolling through countless apps. Hiring Diaz, she thought, "would be a way of working smarter." She's met one guy so far—they went out once, for brunch, and have plans to hang out again—and is supposed to meet a second guy soon. But brunch isn't what makes her experience a success story—it's a change in mindset. "It's gotten me more comfortable with dating," she says. "I didn't do it to and The One...I wasn't so experienced with dating. Jasmine pushed me to be more social, to put forth the effort."

It's difficult to measure success rates. What counts as a happy ending? What if they date for years but never actually wed— doesn't that count? "It's hard to come up with a single metric of 'success,'" Goldstein says. "We are proud that 70 percent of clients go on at least a third date with their matches." She recalls one couple she set up years ago. "She came to me from Orange County. She was very preppy, wore pearls. She thought she wanted a finance guy," Goldstein says. "But I could tell she had an edge. I matched her with a rocker who played in a metal band and was covered in tattoos.

"I told her, 'I'm gonna set you up with this guy, and if you're looking for nights out at the ballet, this is not your guy.' But she was up for an adventure, and they ended up having a lot more in common than they thought." Goldstein is no longer in touch with the couple, but she saw the pictures of their small California wedding—and then their baby—on Facebook.

*Name has been changed

This article appears in the February issue of Marie Claire, on newsstands now.

How did it feel? Not when you fell from heaven, but on November 8, when America elected Donald Trump and hell rushed up to meet you. Was it difficult to eat? Or did you plunge your hand into a box of Vanilla Almond Special K and not stop until the crushed-nut bits got caught under your fingernails? Did you cry when your mom texted you "This is the story of your life," knowing that you've also always tried so hard, only to perpetually come in second place because of your personality and gender? Did you sob again when Hillary Clinton apologized like she'd let us down?

But in those funereal days after, did you once think about your love life?

Some people did, or at least the physical bit. (See: those Craigslist listings seeking post-results sexual healing.) But more often than that, there was discord and violence. Divorce. Men punching women. Wives running husbands over in their Ford Escapes, even though that has been disproven as yet another bogus news story. (But it's still like "Yeah, could see that," isn't it?) A Facebook friend who posted her text exchange with a Bumble bro, in which he chided her for "being a little ridiculous" after she challenged him on voting for the "less poisonous" of the two candidates. (He was still down to get a conciliatory drink, though.)

That's just the anecdotal evidence, but soon, the data will roll out, and we'll have the numbers to back this up. Breakups increased by however-many percent. Swipes plummeted. Matches...continued to never speak to one another.

Love in the time of Trump feels a bit frivolous when there are more pressing matters at hand, such as our professional, reproductive futures and the safety of our loved ones under a Jacksonian Kitchen Cabinet of angry white men. I, for one, have been simply too preoccupied with sorting through the wreckage to bother, especially when fragile masculinity is partly what got us here in the first place.

Before, you could be moderately confident the dude sitting across from you wasn't a pathological liar, but now, you can't be quite as certain that he's not something worse: part of the silent majority that apparently thinks so little of women that they'd prefer to put an angry Cheeto (flavor: vitriol-blasted) in leadership over a rational career politician.

So in the theme of the past couple of weeks, what now? A few suggestions from an individual who only just recently acquired a full emotional range only to lose it again but can somehow still muster the following: Just because we might be entering an era of jingoism and intolerance doesn't mean there's a complete absence of compassion in the world. In fact, there is now the kind of outpouring that comes flowing in after a natural disaster. (Think of how many friends texted to say "I love you" that Wednesday morning.) Float on your back in it. Direct your pain elsewhere. Love trumps hate, and hate can be overcome. And no matter how finely ground it may be, don't close your heart—there's more use for it now than ever.

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Even though I am off Tinder and Bumble—off off, not delete-the-app-in-a-fit-of-pique-but-keep-giving-them-Facebook-access off—and blissfully the same except all the f*ckboys I meet are IRL now, those damn apps still won't leave me be. How are those instruments of auto-torture still so culturally pervasive? And can we really say we're in the dating apocalypse if everyone (else) is still swiping like there's no tomorrow? Debatable, but at least one corner of hell must have frozen over if I'm here as I am now, about to take a stand for all the un-photogenic people out there whose wills to find companionship digitally haven't yet crumpled like so many Egg McMuffin wrappers. WTF? Yes—to the bunkers.

As a person so un-talented at sitting for photos that the resultant images can range from blobfish snapped mid-sneeze to very, very distant relative of Gemma Ward, I cannot stand idly by as my simultaneously cruel and Pollyanna-ish friends dismiss potential matches because "Why does he look fine in some pictures but not in others?" First, there are way better reasons to dismiss potential matches: no bio, selfies only, bad shoes, shares name with grade-school archenemy, threatens "don't be basic." Second, if you want to get a sense of a person's true appearance, simply look at their tagged photos—this is what model scouts do.

• https://twitter.com/cgbposts/status/709861402899554304

But beyond that, I do think this might be where kindness could win over cunning, even though adult life usually proves otherwise. A leap of faith, if you will. (I can't believe myself either.) Most people haven't got friends who are both proficient in photography and patient and generous enough to follow them around and wait until they're flatteringly backlit and laughing prettily with not too much gum showing and in perfect three-quarter view—most people have only got regular friends and iPhones. Bad photos—not tragic or catfish-y ones—are therefore kind of sweet in a time of wanton FaceTuning and fingertip nip-and-tuck-age.

With me in front of a camera, it's a game of chance—you never know what you're going to get. And it's the same with anyone you meet online. Still bail if a dude doesn't even look like the great-great-aunt, twice removed of the impostor in his profile, but before that, cut him some slack. (Again, to self: "You're not getting soft in your old age, are you?")

But then again, not too much mercy, because then that would be a compromise. The most rational, "never complain, never explain, never settle even though you might end up Edie Beale-ing because of your cursed impossibly high standards" answer, then? Simple—if the average of the photos is cute, and the rest is in order, that is quite enough. (We leave the non-superficial bit to you.)

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Steve* and I had been dating for six months when I found myself alone in his apartment, watching snowflakes whirling in and out of the red-orange light of the giant, neon New Yorker hotel sign that blazed outside his bedroom window. He had gotten last-minute tickets to a basketball game and was running late to meet me, but he'd called earlier to tell me that his roommates would let me in and that I was welcome to use his laptop while I waited.

My plan, as I opened the computer, was to look for secondhand furniture on Craigslist. When I got to the website's home page, most of the links were blue, signifying that they'd never been clicked on. But under the Personals heading, the words "Casual Encounters" were purple. As in, previously visited.

That was an innocent discovery. The not-so-innocent one came next, as I weighed my options. I'd always been anti-snooping—even people in relationships deserve their privacy—but if Steve had been casually encountering other girls all this time we'd been together, how could I not investigate? What if a silent STD was ravaging my reproductive system while I sat there debating the ethics of looking through my boyfriend's browser history?

Once I clicked on the history, it took me less than a minute to find what I was looking for. That afternoon, the laptop had been used to visit a Hotmail account I'd never heard of, and someone had sent an attachment with the curious file name "NakedSteve.jpg." I searched the laptop for that file and found a folder. There were hundreds of images in it.

It's a testament to how totally unprepared I was for any of this that my first befuddled thought, as I squinted at the tiny thumbnail photos, was that I'd uncovered a giant, secret stash of pictures of pink rocket ships. My second thought was that if Steve wasn't cheating on me, then he was almost certainly gay. Whatever his reason for having that many dick pics on his hard drive, it couldn't be good.

I called him immediately. When he answered the phone, the roar of the crowd at Madison Square Garden nearly drowned out his hello. "You need to come home right now," I said. He must have guessed the reason why, because all he said was, "OK."

I didn't find out the whole truth that night. Yes, Steve said, he'd visited Craigslist's Casual Encounters, but only because it was funny. The dick pics? A prank by his roommates. And the secret e-mail account? "It's not mine! I can't even get in!" he exclaimed, rapidly typing and then showing me an error message: Your Password Is Incorrect. There were real tears in his eyes as he swore that it was all a crazy misunderstanding. He would never lie to me. I had to know that, didn't I?

It was my first experience with the "It wasn't me!" defense, and, incredibly, I found myself nodding along. I told him I loved him, which I did, and that I believed him, which I didn't—but thought I might be able to if given time. I would just convince myself that despite the evidence, his version of events was the truth, the way some people choose to believe in a 10,000-year-old Earth.

As it turns out, faith is not my strong suit. Despite my determination to move on and Steve's attempts to gaslight me ("You're killing our relationship with your mistrust," he said, when I tried to discuss it again a few days later), I couldn't unknow what I knew: I was being lied to. The knowledge made me crazy. We fought constantly over the next month, as I became a person I didn't recognize: paranoid, suspicious, fearful, miserable, and as desperate to learn the truth as I was to pretend it didn't exist.

Finally, I hacked into the Hotmail account and read every single message with a mix of fascination and horror. At any given moment of our six-month relationship, my boyfriend had been juggling half a dozen e-mail exchanges with different women, describing to each one, in wildly lascivious detail, what he was going to do to her with his throbbing, giant NakedSteve.jpg.

Some of the threads went on for weeks, the conversation evolving from graphic sexual scenarios to mundane hellos and how-was-your-days, then veering off again into X-rated territory. Sometimes he told them his real name and sent photos of his real junk; sometimes he used a pseudonym and a picture of someone else's penis. Occasionally, they'd dance around the possibility of meeting up. As far as I could tell, the cheating never crossed the line into meatspace. No dates were made; no addresses were exchanged; none of these women ever touched Steve's body—or even saw his face.

I couldn't understand it. I knew that there were people out there who lived secret lives on the Internet, but I'd always assumed that those people did it because they had to. Because they were lonely, unwanted, iso- lated, friendless, and (most especially) sexless. Steve was none of those things. It wasn't just that he was cute and successful, with good friends and a loving family. It was that he was a nice guy—bland, amiable, even a bit boring. He was the guy people described as "husband material." He was safe. It was why I was dating him; our relationship wasn't exciting, but it was refreshingly free of unpleasant surprises. How could this guy, of all guys, be a secret, serial catfish?

I was desperate to understand, and so I begged Steve for honesty and promised I wouldn't judge him. I asked him to explain to me why I shouldn't feel betrayed. But his response was always the same. "It's none of your business!" he would scream, refusing to meet my eyes. "It was a fantasy!"

It took me longer than it should have to realize what he meant by "fantasy." The boyfriend I knew only ever wanted sex in the missionary position; he would shush me if I made too much noise. The guy in those e-mails, by contrast, was confident, arrogant, and fantastically filthy. I would have liked to meet him. "You could have told me," I said. "I would have exchanged sexy e-mails with you."

His look of horror said it all. "You're my girlfriend," he said. "I can't use that kind of language with you." I didn't know whether to laugh or scream. I was furious because I felt cheated-on and his admission seemed to give me proof. But it was almost comical: For Steve, the women didn't matter at all. He didn't want to be with someone else; he wanted to be someone else.

Shortly after that realization, I ended the relationship. Partly because of the lies, but more so because of the truth: This was why Steve had always seemed so uncomplicated. The nice-guy persona I'd found so comforting was nothing but a mask, a cover for a man whose discomfort with himself ran so deep that he couldn't bear to confront it. In the e-mails he sent me after our breakup, Steve bemoaned that he'd "ruined" me. He was sure that I'd spend the rest of my life bitter, fearful, and deep-combing every future boyfriend's hard drive for a secret stash of dick pics. In low moments, I wondered if he was right.

But in the weeks that followed, I discovered that just as Steve was never truly himself with me, I hadn't been myself with him, either. Before I got the idea of settling for a "safe" romance, I had been a girl who trusted easily, fell hard, and braved heartbreak because I knew from experience that I could handle it. Somewhere in the choice to be with Steve, I'd lost that fearlessness. When I left him, it came roaring back, along with the realization that I didn't want a nice guy. I wanted someone sharp, smart, passionate, and confident—and genuine and vulnerable. As it turned out, I already knew that man. We'd met at a corporate softball game months earlier and had become close friends since, bonding as much over our friendly disagreements as our shared love of baseball and books.

I married him the following year. I had never met anyone who made me laugh as hard, feel as loved, or think as deeply—and I understood, in a way I hadn't before, that those things made us a surer thing than any safe choice ever could. My nice-guy boyfriend turned out to be a self-loathing liar, and my attempt at a predictable romance turned out to be a farce. But I remain grateful for what it taught me: that a true connection, the kind worth having, can be complicated and messy, but it is, above all else, real.

*Name has been changed. This article appears in the November issue of Marie Claire, on newsstands now.

Some blame an "out of sight, out of mind" mentality for why many long-distance relationships seem to fail, but recent studies have found that the separation can be a great advantage for couple satisfaction. One thing is clear though— it's never easy to keep a long-distance relationship afloat, and it can often take extra finesse to keep the spark alive. To hear some tips on how to weather the pitfalls of a long-distance romance, we asked Dr. Paulette Sherman—a licensed psychologist with a specialty in romantic relationships, and author of the guided meditation companion Book of Sacred Baths—for her advice. Her suggestions on several ways to work together when you're miles apart, below.

Figure Out Your Ideal Communication Style

Talking every single day might be overkill in a normal relationship, but when you're long-distance, lack of communication can prey on insecurities. The first thing to recognize, says Sherman, is that every person is different. "When two people are together, some people don't like to get texts when they're at work. Or some people want to communicate multiple times a day. Hopefully you've known this person before and you're not just starting out with the distance, so you have a greater sense of them, but you should figure out the best way to reach out to each other so you feel connected and have regular times to check in."

Say What You Need

With communicating, Sherman says, the most crucial thing to do at the outset of a long-distance relationship is to know what you need from your partner and to have the vulnerability to say so. Research shows that people who are able to meet each other's needs (or bids for attention) are the ones who stay together the longest.

Establish Trust Boundaries

Which brings us to the importance of establishing trust boundaries when you're not directly involved in the dailies of your partner's life. Dr. Sherman suggests that if you have prior baggage, e.g. you've been cheated on in the past, you should communicate how you can maintain a trusting relationship with the other person. With one caveat: "You need to make sure that you're not being super controlling and that the other person's okay with it. But if you know you have a need, you can address it in the beginning before it gets ugly or out of control. Whatever agreement you both make will build trust and establish integrity."

Integrating the other person in your life is another way to make your partner feel more at ease about the distance. Says Sherman, "Couples have different boundaries but if you're fine with surprising each other and/or meeting each other's friends when they do visit, they won't feel like this outlier in your life or that you have a secret relationship."

Deal with Fights Effectively

Going to bed angry is a bad enough feeling in itself, but couple that with hundreds or thousands of miles between you and disputes are instantly amplified. Sherman recommends mitigating fights by talking through concerns while they're fresh instead of letting them build, and if it can be done, tabling State of the Union discussions to in-person visits. She also recommends getting out of the habit of texting during fights—en lieu of calling—to clear the air. There's more room for miscommunication and misunderstandings via text, so being able to provide context and explain yourself either via video or a phone call is always preferable.

Keep It Fresh

Renew that puppy love feeling often—keep flirting with each other and doing the little things you did when your relationship was new. When you can't see your significant other, it's all the more important to remind them how much they mean to you. Sherman recommends finding creative ways to show affection, whether that be "just because" gifts and care packages, old-school love letters, poems, flowers, or tapes. Research shows that couples who do novel things together are happier, so surprises are a positive. In-person, she says to try things that you wouldn't normally do.

Learn How to Cope With Your Emotions When You're Lonely

Dealing with feelings of loneliness and separation can be one of the toughest aspects of being away from your partner. To cope, Sherman says, "It's important to find ways when you're alone or lonely to shift into a state of love and reconnect with yourself and shift your mood. To get your thoughts more positive, you need rituals or ways to work with your thoughts, feelings, and emotions (some people might do yoga or journal, for example) because your partner isn't there."

Plan Visits Ahead

An ocean between two people has a tendency to add an intensity and urgency to the relationship that might not exist without the distance. It's important to talk about future visits so that you both have a tangible goal to meet and to continue the conversation about your plans to eventually live in the same zip code. But don't push for a commitment before you're both ready. Says Sherman, "Talking about the future gives you a vision board or a shared vision that you're working toward and you're co-creating a life together that will eventually end up together, if that's the case."

Keep the Romance Alive

A no-brainer for any long-distance relationship is re-establishing that you care about the other person throughout the course of the separation. "Tell them why you love them and why you chose them," says Sherman. "It's also really good to support each other's successes. Studies have found that being there when things are going right is more important than when things are going badly. So I think it's extra important when they get a raise at work or little wins to acknowledge that and do your best to celebrate that."

Maintaining a sexual connection is also important because Sherman notes that it's the one thing separating a friendship from a serious relationship. Whether your preference is virtual Skype sex, talking dirty over the phone, or sexting each other, etc., the goal is to limit frustration over not seeing the other person. "And then when you do see each other, obviously make time for intimacy. It's so few and far-between that you want those in-person moments to be special."

Live Your Own Life

Becoming too dependent on your partner can be the kiss of death to any relationship, but Sherman especially recommends building a life for yourself outside of the other person in a long-distance one. The aim is to avoid putting too much pressure on one person to fulfill all of your needs. "The happiest couples," she says, "are able to maintain hobbies and friends outside of a relationship, and when you're long-distance, it's even more important because that person can't be your whole life if they're not physically there."

Manage Expectations

In a long-distance relationship, one of the most fundamental difficulties to reckon with is checking your expectations of how things will be versus the reality of schedules and communication barriers. "Again, we're all different," says Sherman, "and especially if we're not reading body language cues and seeing each other on a regular basis, it's important to discuss what you need and what the other person needs so that your time can be well-spent together."

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Emotional numbness. The ability to come up with whip-smart double entendres on the spot (actually so useful in so many situations, IMO). Jacked thumbs. These are the symptoms of dating-app addiction, a disease that affects millions of Tinder/Bumble/Hinge/ FarmersOnly users across the globe. Here, five women—some in recovery, some relapsed—on finding heart in a heartless dating culture and what it's like once you make it to the other side.

The last straw

"I feel so much less pressure after quitting the apps. I hadn't realized how much of my free time was spent swiping through hundreds of faces. Now that I have stopped, I have so much more time to engage in real-life conversations with my roommates instead of being sucked into my apps with my thumb glued to the phone.

I went on a slew of bad dates, and the worst one put me over the edge. Within five minutes of meeting me, the guy asked me if I was getting my master's degree to increase my salary since, 'teachers don't make very much money.' My jaw was on the floor. Then he spent the rest of the date bragging to me about his Ivy League education and all of the exotic travel plans he had coming up. That was it for me!"—Allie, 25, Chicago, IL, 4 months clean

The etymologist

"While having a steady stream of guys complimenting my smile and asking to play 20 Questions at my fingertips was entertaining, one day, after swiping through users unconsciously, I decided to quit. Tinder was more like Tetras than eHarmony. I was looking to start something romantically and was still trying to figure out exactly what I wanted. But Tinder wasn't helping—it was just a distraction. My intentions were as unclear to myself as they were to the guys who kept nudging me to hang out. Although a number of my friends have met their significant others through Tinder, I still haven't come to terms with having to devise a 'how we met' story. I love not having Tinder. I'm not constantly reminded or harassed about my relationship status. Better yet, when I meet a guy in person, I can actually tell what he means when he says something and don't have to send a message to my friend to decode the sexual innuendo." —Chelsea, 22, Brooklyn, NY, 3 months clean

The rom-com heroine

"I quit dating apps because I realized the men I was meeting through them weren't looking for real relationships like I was. It seemed like I had been on endless 'dates' where the men were smart, courteous, and interested in me, but they ghosted immediately after I hooked up with them (usually the third date). Since I have a lot of confidence in my hookup game, I realized they were waiting it out for easy sex and weren't trying to find a compatible partner, no matter how genuine they seemed at first. I eventually gave up on the apps altogether and decided to focus my energy on real-life men. Unfortunately, it turns out men IRL aren't so different from dating-app men, and I'm still waiting on my Prince Charming. In all honesty, I think the dating game is a sham, and I'm more likely to fall in love with my geeky best guy friend than I am to meet the man of my dreams on a 'date' of any kind."—Sally, 25, Chicago, IL, 1 year clean

The Carrie Bradshaw

"I reactivated my Tinder profile approximately one month after the end of a serious two-year relationship. I figured I was single and having fun, but quickly realized Tinder was only confusing me more. After a few failed awkward meet-ups, I decided to delete it and completely focus on myself like a true post-heartbreak cliché. Being Tinder-free is amazing. Attention is nice, but dating myself is so much better. Not to mention no weird messages about 'the swirl.'"—Simedar, 22, Brooklyn, NY, 1 month clean

The one who, against all reason, still has hope

"Reasons for being Tinder-free: Following a string of uncomfortable, boring, or bizarre dates—including meeting up with someone who looked 0 percent like his profile pics and a guy who bragged about his painkiller addiction—I decided to take a break from using the dating apps. I felt like every person I met in real life did not match up to my app-based expectations of them and was constantly disappointed. The other issue I kept encountering was a general lack of interest and caring—I'd accidentally forget to respond to a prospective date for five days or someone I'd gone on one or two casual dates with would disappear off the face of the Earth with no explanation. The dating apps almost made it too easy to meet people, so as a result, the interactions felt inconsequential and meaningless. I didn't so much decide to stop using online-dating apps as simply forgot to check any of them. For about four months. The result was more free time, more time spent with friends, and less time worrying if I was coming up with flirty yet clever responses to strangers' messages or had picked cute enough profile pictures.

While I can't say my dating life skyrocketed—maybe the opposite—it was kind of liberating to not be thoughtlessly scanning potential suitors whilst bored at work, and not nixing people solely based on some stupid quote in their 'About Me' section. The people I've met outside of dating apps have been friends of friends, which usually means you have more than just a person in common; you have similar backgrounds or a sense of humor or are both obsessed with the toothless kid in Stranger Things. I still like to peruse Bumble or Hinge occasionally just to see what's out there, but I haven't found that I'm missing much."—Catherine, 25, New York, NY, 4 months clean (though "crumbled from societal pressure and did some light Bumble-ing" last week)

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Why would you ever go outside for a date night when you've got Netflix instead? And now that's especially true, thanks to a new study in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships that says binge-watching TV shows together can bring you closer as a couple.

Researchers at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland tested this theory with two different studies. In the first, they recruited 259 college students who were in exclusive relationships for an average of 16 months. Participants reported information about their relationships and answered questions about their relationship quality, the number of friends they shared, and how often they watched movies and TV shows with their partners.

The scientists found that relationship quality was higher if a couple shared a larger number of friends, which makes sense—and that effect was also there if they shared lots of media. And for you cynics out there, the research ruled out the average time couples spent together, which means that binge-watchers weren't just closer because they spent more time with one another. The media had a specific effect on their bond.

In the second study, 131 participants were asked to think about the friends they shared or did not share with their partners; they then were asked about their desire to watch movies and TV shows with their partners, and how much they watched things together. It turns out that participants who were reminded about friends they didn't share with their loved ones were more motivated to "share media" with them.

The study boils down to this: If a couple lacks mutual friends in the real world, the characters on the shows they watch together can be a pretty decent substitute. If you spend hours debating whether Walter White was the hero or the villain of Breaking Bad, it can have the same effect as, say, gossiping over your friend Judy's latest relationship drama. You're still sharing a social world, even if it's fictional.

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The craze over the 36 Questions posited by the New York Times last year as the pathway to falling in love with someone would draw skepticism from any true love cynic. The thinking behind the questions—ranging from mild to moderately-probing questions about life and death and relationships—is that opening up to someone about these topics introduces vulnerability and openness, and mutual vulnerability inspires intimacy (yada, yada, yada). But everyone knows that a vulnerability session is not always a comfortable way to while away the hours when you're getting to know someone.

To get a second opinion on what types of questions people could ask someone they're dating to get to know them beyond the surface-level, we spoke with Dr. Monica O'Neal, a clinical psychologist and relationship expert based in Boston who lectures at the Harvard Medical School.

She notes that there is no cut-and-dried "correct" way to approach dating and getting to know someone, nor a specific set of questions everyone should ask a partner, but she advises people—especially those looking for more serious relationships—to think about questions that help you have a better understanding of what you need and whether or not somebody is a good fit for you—intellectually and emotionally.

"If you think about it," she says, "if you're dating someone, and you're going to eventually want something serious with them, you want to meet someone who's willing to sit through the discomfort and the ambiguity and to be able to ask deeper questions—not get fixated on whether something's right or wrong—and be curious about the responses."

Below, her recommended questions for a typical dating sequence, from the first date to a point where you're getting more serious about someone. Timing of these is important, she says, based on what age you are, where you're at in a relationship, and whether you're pursuing a more serious relationship or not. Yes, the questions are a little scary, but the goal is to ultimately gauge a response that helps you read whether your partner demonstrates a range of valued traits, from openness and flexibility, to curiosity and empathy.

"What made you decide to swipe right? What made you decide to ask me out?"

Dr. Monica O'Neal: I would say that this is a good question for everybody to ask, regardless of their age range, not in a way where you're questioning, "Why do you like me?" but more along the lines of, "What about me in particular made me stand out?" I know some people might think it sounds conceited, but I don't because I think it gives a nice opportunity for the other person to volley and say, "What made *you* decide to do it?" How deep or how thoughtful the other person is might give you some information about who they are. If they say, "Well, you're hot or you have nice boobs," that might be true and it would be rude if they said they didn't find you attractive, but you want to know that they're going to go deeper than your physical qualities. And on the flip side, be honest with them and see how they respond. And if they don't respond at all, people might say, "I don't know, it's too deep of a question." You have to ask yourself, "Do you want to be with somebody who would be that quick to shut down? Or do you want to be with someone who has a little more room to push themselves and go someplace different?"

"Have you been in love before? What kind of person do you typically fall for?"

MO: There's magic in this question. I usually suggest this for a slightly older crowd, and this is a question that you have to pull off with a lot of confidence. You can ask this in the context of knowing what made the other person swipe right. And really listen, pay attention, have a little conversation about it. And then when they quiet off a little bit, look them solid in the eye and say to them, "Do I seem like I'm that kind of woman?" It's a very powerful moment. What it does is, you can see the other person get uncomfortable. And it's not like you're trying to make them uncomfortable, but you want to stop the music for a moment and make sure that they're looking at you in a particular way. And the people who can do that and want to do that, I think that would give you a real clue if this is someone to pursue. And that's a subtle way of saying, "I want something serious. I want to be special." Because we all do.

Past relationships...

MO: I would say that this a third date type of question. It doesn't have to be as straightforward as, "Tell me about your last relationship." It can simply be like, "Oh you've been in a relationship. Well, tell me about it. How'd you meet? How did it end?" And so on. You don't want to go into too much detail but I would listen to see if you hear, "Oh, it was mutual." I think that's BS. It's never mutual. Somebody has to pull the trigger, even if both people are unhappy. I would really listen to how somebody answers that question. Are they answering that question openly and honestly? Are they putting down their partners?

"Of all your past exes and people you've dated, what is the thing they complain the most about you?"

MO: This is for when you're really liking each other, maybe on about the fourth or fifth or sixth date. And pay attention if someone says, "They wouldn't say anything. I was a great boyfriend." And be prepared to give your own answer. At any point during the first few four or five dates, you shouldn't be disclosing the most painful baggage. Be careful about the stuff that you share about family. You don't want to go too fast, too deeply, because it's hard and vulnerable. And you should only make yourself more vulnerable when somebody's proven that they're someone you can go a little deeper with.

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