S1 E.5 Dating as a Millennial
In this EpisodeLast week we talked about Adriana’s fertility journey, so we saw it fitting that this week we’d turn to what we make fun of Mariah for – her singleness. But in all seriousness, Mariah has had her share of dating experiences, and the more she dates, the more she realizes how hard it is, how much it sucks, but how important it is to share those experiences with others, just like how Adriana feels about sharing her fertility journey.
Let’s take a little walk down memory lane, and talk about some of Mariah’s past relationships, shall we? In college, she met someone (we’re going to call him Basketball, because, well… he played basketball). They had been dating for four months when he got an offer to play basketball at a different college in Oklahoma. They decided to give long distance a try, since he said he wouldn’t go to Oklahoma if she wouldn’t stay with him. There were obviously some trust issues between them, because it’s a big step to try long distance with someone who you’ve only known for four months – but, regardless, they tried it anyway.
One weekend when she was visiting him in Oklahoma, Mariah decided to go through his phone (which, by the way, we think is completely valid!). She saw a text to an unsaved number, and it looked like her boyfriend had sent his location to this person. So, Mariah being the bold girl she is, called the number to get to the bottom of it. The girl on the other end of the phone said Basketball (lol) was trying to get her and her friend to come over to his and his friend’s house. The whole time, this girl said, he wasn’t acting like he had a girlfriend.
He defended himself and said that he was trying to be a wingman to his friend, but something felt off. After this, Mariah continued to give him the benefit of the doubt, but felt that she was making excuse after excuse for him. Here’s what we have to say about situations like this: if you’re going through something similar, and you find yourselves making excuses, we want you to know that you are entitled to that, and you have to learn in your own time that you deserve better. Mariah kept making excuses for this boy, but she had to in order to learn in her own time that what he was doing to her wasn’t right. So, by no means are we trying to discredit Mariah or anyone who may be going through something similar, but what we will say is that red flags are called red flags for a reason.
Fast forward a little bit, and Basketball had come up to visit Mariah in New Jersey. When he fell asleep while they were watching a movie on his laptop, some suspicious messages started coming through. Mariah started to dig a little deeper, and found thirteen suspicious text conversations with unsaved numbers. And again, she called some of these numbers to get to the bottom of it. After talking to some of the girls, and after all of them said that they never would have known that this guy had a girlfriend, Mariah called Adriana crying to tell her what had happened.
And while this situation was awful for Mariah, looking back, she does feel like it was a sign from God. Seeing 13 different suspicious conversations between him and other girls was inexcusable, and if it had only been one or two messages, she might have excused him again.
Okay, so what’s the point of telling you the whole story of this relationship? The point is that there’s something to be learned from it, and using experiences like this, no matter how crappy they are, just helps us to grow and know what we actually want in relationships. From this relationship, Mariah learned that love shouldn’t be hard. Yes, there will always be hardships in relationships, but that always happens. If it’s hard for you to rationalize loving this person, then it’s not the right relationship for you. Love should not have to feel like you’re trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, and if it feels like something’s off… it probably is!
So now we move into the next relationship – one that felt a whole lot easier than the one with Basketball. This one - the actor - told Mariah that he loved her, and made it clear that he meant it. So why, then, did he blindside her and leave? This is where the confusion comes in, because this is the struggle with dating as a millennial and in this world that we live in when everyone is so readily available with the swipe of a finger. We have this overload of options available to us at our fingertips, that most of the time people aren’t even willing to put effort into building a relationship, because there’s always another option.
And so here we are now, just as confused as we were when we started this episode. Dating as a millennial sucks, but Adriana offered a piece of advice that might be useful to keep in mind as we continue navigating the dating world. She says that you can be with anyone you want to be with, but you have to first give them the opportunity to fall in love with you. We can’t just find the one teeny tiny thing that bothers us about a person on the first date – or even on the first profile view! – and expect them to come back to us because they like us. Why would he come back to you if you’re too busy jumping on him for everything he did or didn’t do? Let the early stages of a relationship be a time to get to know each other without judgment instead of anxiety that it’s not going to work out. In this world, it’s normal that we feel content with being alone, and we feel empowered to be independent, but that can sometimes lead to not giving things a fighting chance, which could be the reason why none of these relationships work out for us.
At the end of the day, we just have to be hopeful that looking back, we will understand all of this, and we’ll know why we had to go through it. Just like Adriana had to go through infertility so that she could be led to Ford, one day we’ll understand why Mariah has to glow through this dating journey.
Important Times0:45 - So… Mariah’s single.
4:50 - Start of Mariah’s dating journey
7:22 - A word from Mariah
18:25 - Love should be easy
20:40 - Another word from Mariah & the next relationship
27:07 - Last word from Mariah & seeing relationships in a different light
33:54 - Overload of options
37:26 - Adriana’s nugget of wisdom
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Welcome bestie.
We’re so glad you’re here.
We’re Adriana and Mariah. Co-hosts, entrepreneurs, BFFs, and girls just like you trying to figure it out as we go.
