Is it Embarrassing to Admit that I Met my Partner on Tinder?

Illustration by Yinne Smith

Dating during the midst of the pandemic has obviously been quite the challenge. When the lockdown restrictions were at their toughest, it proved difficult to date, especially for those of us who do not prefer to talk over-the-phone.This is where the help of apps came in.

I had frequented Tinder and Bumble now and again when I got bored of being single and wanted to chat to new people. Being newly out as queer, apps were the safest way to be assured that the other person was also queer. Dating as a feminine presenting woman-loving-woman is notoriously challenging, so to have the security that the cute girl staring back at you, is in fact gay too, was great.

During a particular point of lockdown when I was living by myself, these dating apps became a great distraction from loneliness. They provided a bit of excitement, like a love lottery, which came with a few nice chats. I think it also provided excitement to a potential future in a time that, in the midst of COVID, seemed quite bleak and unpredictable. How romantic to start a love story amidst a world crisis!

However, there is a stereotype amongst queer women that the conversation starters are to comment on how people’s attractiveness. From that, it is pretty impossible to move the conversation on. Admittedly, that did happen to me a few times…

I did go on a couple of dates with girls I met off Tinder, once everyone was allowed to meet outside and socially distanced. However, it wasn’t until the start of August that I would meet the girl who was going to end up being my now girlfriend.

With dating apps, I seem to go through cycles:

1)      Download app

2)      Spend hours on it every night looking for someone and having average conversations for about a week

3)      Delete the app

4)      Repeat cycle

During the pandemic I did go through quite a few of these cycles and I’m sure the locals got to see my face pop up a few times and think I looked familiar. However, during one of my frenzied uses of Tinder, I happened upon this beautiful, dark-haired Brazilian girl who eventually slid into my DMs with a super original ‘Heyy x.’ I usually would have ignored such a feeble attempt at a conversation starter but because she was so gorgeous, I decided to reply.

After three days of slow and fairly dry and trivial conversation, I decided to give her my WhatsApp (pretty much second base in the queer dating world) and what a whirlwind that unravelled from there! After just over a month of dating, we decided to become girlfriends, as neither of us were interested in getting to know anyone else, so it just seemed like the natural progression.

We once joked that we’d have to tell people that we met somewhere a little bit more romantic than a dating app. It spawned my curiosity into the question:

Is it embarrassing to admit that I met my partner on a dating app?

Although it’s not the movie romantic portrayal of being flirty and courting and then wondering if the other person is interested in you back, I don’t think it’s embarrassing at all. There seems to be a stigma around dating apps and how they’re only for people that can’t find anyone in real life.

I happen to think that they are actually wonderful inventions. Of course, there are a lot of dangers that come with them, as with anything on the internet, but, they can be a great tool to connect people. As I mentioned earlier, dating as a queer femme woman means it would be slightly difficult to date in real life, as people always assume you’re straight, unless you’re waving a big rainbow in their face (and sometimes not even then).

There is something super romantic about a tale of two lovers who met by bumping into each other and then went on a spur of the moment coffee date and fell in love. But it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. What matters is how happy and romantic your relationship is now.

I used to think that if I ever ended up with anyone I met from Tinder, then we’d have to make up some other story about how we met. I can’t quite put my finger on where that embarrassment originally stems from, perhaps because it is assumed that if you’re on dating apps you’re desperate. And it’s never cool to be desperate. But honestly - who cares?

Without Tinder, I would never have met my Brazilian beauty and I would not be laughing as much as she makes me laugh. We lived such a distance away, chances are our paths would never have crossed. But now I have met someone who I feel incredibly comfortable with, who puts a smile on my face every time I see her name on my phone, who sends me flowers when I’m feeling down, and who tells me what a blessing I am, every day. And is that something to be embarrassed about? Definitely not.

So, when people ask me how we met, I will be honest and say that we met on Tinder. It is, after all, a modern romance.