I did not expect to meet someone so quickly after arriving in London this summer. I was trying to set myself up for success, though, and I switched my Hinge location weeks before landing to collect potential suitors. I never spend much time swiping on the apps anymore, it's too time-consuming—so I just respond to whoever engages with my profile first. So, by the time I touched down at Heathrow on May 30th, I already had two dates lined up for the week, and I was excited. But within days, both dates fell through (I blamed it on Mercury retrograde, which was just coming to an end at the time). Normally, I let failed attempts at first dates roll off my shoulders, but I was really bummed—especially since one date left me without plans on my first Friday night in London. This was not how things were supposed to go.
Just a week later, though, with Mercury finally direct, I had my first date with a guy I wasn't sure I would like, but he was witty, and we had that effortless pre-date banter that made it feel like we already knew each other. Once we were face to face, things just flowed. We could not have been more different, he was 10 years my junior, but we bonded over our mutual missions in the mental health space. A straight man who had already been in therapy and had a master's degree in Psychology? Not to mention he was 6'5, but I digress. I felt like I had stumbled upon a bit of a unicorn. When I left that date (with plans already set for our second), I had that rare feeling that this person and I were crossing paths for a reason.
As the weeks passed and we spent more time together, I didn't feel any anxiety. I didn't know that it could be this easy. It felt so freeing. I could date someone and not fall into a spiral of overthinking, re-reading every text conversation, replaying things he said, and looking for context clues of whether he was interested in me or not. I never had to guess because he consistently communicated his interest in me. Yes, even at 36, this is pretty foreign to me, thanks to my penchant for the emotionally unavailable. And even as I pushed myself to go on other dates, it only reinforced how rare it feels to have such an easy and instant connection with someone.
But eventually, the anxiety did start to creep in around week 5 or 6 of our summer romance when our schedules stopped lining up. As the distance increased, so did my anxiety.