The Single Bride – Fyona’s Story

I’d been single my whole life. I had never been on a date, I’d never been kissed, I’d never held hands, I’d never had anyone show any expression of interest in me what-so-ever. At 28 years of age, I was remarkably single.

Of course everyone’s natural solution to my singleness was to try online dating. Fueled by a mix of exasperation and curiosity I signed up so I could prove to everyone, once and for all, that online dating doesn’t work and don’t you dare suggest I try it ever again.

I found myself chatting with guys who I was clearly not compatible with. I realized I was too scared to judge anyone. I kept thinking ‘what if’. What if I scroll past the love of my life because I didn’t like his profile picture?

It became clear to me that I needed to give this to God. I needed to trust God to orchestrate my life, I needed God to sort through all these profiles for me and orchestrate my online dating experience!

So I prayed – I asked God to only let the right guys respond to my messages. I told him that I wouldn’t end any interactions; I’d let God decided who I’d talk to and for how long. I know my prayer worked because from then on hardly any of the messages I sent out received a response but the responses I did receive, turned into genuine conversations.

After one false start with a guy who I thought was really interested in me I had a week off from all the dating sites. I felt crushed. I knew I had to get back on the horse but it was beginning to all feel too hard. In that five week time period I’d introduced myself to so many people. It felt like I was standing in a shop window trying to sell myself as ‘The World’s Best Girlfriend/Wife’ and no one was buying.

After my break I decided to try again.

It was a get in, get out mission. I did a nationwide search for all the guys in my age bracket, compiled a list of my top ten matches and sent a personal message to each one introducing myself and trying to start a conversation.  I received one response – a templated email saying he’d like to get to know me more but he didn’t have a paid account.

I remember so clearly sitting there during some combination of an exasperated sigh and an eye roll. I thought ‘this guy is so tight; he’s not even prepared to pay the $30 subscription fee – clearly he’s not that serious about this.’

But then I remembered my prayer and promise to God that I wouldn’t end any interaction – so I replied to his message and sent him my email address. I thought if he does turn out to be a freak I can always block him.

I had spent 10,785 days of my life waiting and then suddenly there he was. Monday, the 29th September 2014. My 10,786th day. A template email sitting in my inbox.

We started madly writing emails to each other, it was like a spark that quickly burst into a fire. Within two weeks we planning our first Skype.

For the first time in my life I had a real connection and chemistry with a guy and he felt the same way towards me. I couldn’t believe we’d found each other – It was an overwhelming gift from God and it was also terrifying!

When Dave and I met we didn’t have a single mutual friend. We lived 5 hours apart and were unfamiliar with each other’s home towns. We had to learn everything about each other.

I remember a few months after getting to know each other we started discussing dating and I started feeling more and more anxious. You’d think after all those years of being single I’d be so thrilled to be in a relationship – but oddly enough it wasn’t like that.

It felt like I lived on an island with all of the other single girls and one by one, a boat would come and a girl would sail away with the man of her dreams and the rest of us were left, waiting, watching the horizon.

But as time had passed I’d stopped watching the horizon and I’d made the island my home. I even had a tribe. I was the Single Girl Island Queen and I knew every rock and tree and grain of sand on our pretty little island. You could see the boats sail past the island with happy couples and growing families on them…

but the island was also a place that was off limits to them – it was my home and after a lifetime on land my legs had grown fearful of the ocean.

I remember explaining all of this to Dave, how terrified I was to leave my island and get onto a boat with him, how I felt like I had built an empire here and leaving it was almost unthinkable. I’d fought for so long to make this home that I could hardly entertain the thought of abandoning it all now – leaving the solid land for this unknown life at sea.

It was more than a month after that conversation before we actually started officially dating – and even then I was still struggling with the transition – an electric mix of excitement and trepidation.

We got engaged in October 2015 and married in February 2016.

I’ve been scared every step of the way – but I’ve also been brave. The first time I met Dave face to face I hardly slept the night before. I prayed non-stop for the entire drive because it was the only thing that would stop me turning the car around and driving home.

But I still went. I put my heart in the game and fought every urge within me to reach in and pull it back to safety.

For most people, I imagine that the thought of being anxious or fearful about no longer being single is a foreign concept. But when I think about it; I realise that everyone has something in his or her life that involves fear and anxiety and faith.

It sounds crazy but it never crossed my mind that signing up to an online dating site would actually lead to me being in a relationship.

My single life was a tough thing to let go of. But, by the grace of God, I am richer now in life than I have ever been before. Not just because I have a husband who easily surpasses any dream ideal I’d ever conjured but, because I’m with the person who God hand-picked for me,

and living a God orchestrated life, whatever it looks like, is the finest way to live.

 

This is an excerpt from The Single Bride by Fyona Matters.

The Single Bride is specifically for girls over 25 who have experienced the heartbreak and disillusion associated with being single longer than they ever thought they would be. I don’t mean a short break between boyfriends, I mean years and years of looking at their future and wondering if this is it. 

Download The Single Bride here.