I found the woman of my dreams, but one text changed everything

Normally, after a few hours of a date, I was anxiously ready to make tracks, but with Poppy* I never wanted to leave. And what was supposed to just be drinks in the afternoon had turned into a nine-hour bubble of bliss.

So when she turned to me and asked: ‘Are you happy?’ I could honestly say, for the first time in my dating life, that the answer was yes. 

That’s why it hurt all the more when, just 10 days after our perfect first date, she texted me to say she was leaving the country for work, for a year.

For the last decade, I’d had an on-off relationship with every dating app under the sun. 

Almost all of my romantic connections have started online. So while I don’t want to bite the hand that feeds me, like many others, I have more horror stories than I care to admit.

From women professing their love for me after only meeting a handful of times to dates who told me to my face that they never wanted to meet in the first place… you name it, it’s happened. 

I’m not wholly innocent, of course, and I have hated myself each time I re-downloaded an app for a feeling of validation. But let’s face it, it’s nice to be told you’re attractive without the strings attached.

After a more serious relationship that left me feeling fragile, I knew I wanted to spend 2024 fully in my Samantha Jones era. Play the field, not settle down and just have the time of my life. 

Given that the women-loving-women dating pool is only so big, it should have been an easy goal to achieve. But that all changed when I met Poppy.

Staring back at me on Hinge with big blue eyes and a dimpled smile, I didn’t think twice about swiping for her.

She was based in an area of London that I absolutely hated after multiple bad dating experiences there, but she seemed like the kind of person I could overlook that for.

Poppy immediately seemed inviting and friendly even just through pictures, like you were able to tell her your darkest secrets without any judgement.

After I reached out, I discovered she was actually in Mexico, working off the end of a four-month cruise ship contract and was due to return to London in three weeks. 

Honestly, at that point I assumed the conversation would fizzle out just like it had with the graveyard of other matches I already had. But the opposite happened.

We’d stay up into the early hours messaging each other about work, family, Taylor Swift, how much we each missed sex and even unearthed that the cuddly pig she’d bought at a market wasn’t actually a pig at all.

Nothing was off-limits, and that created an overwhelming sense of comfort.

Naturally, it wasn’t long before I yearned for her to come home so that we could meet in person. I’d only heard her Irish tones in one curt voice note she was embarrassed to send, but every time her name popped up on my phone, I couldn’t help but smile.

Poppy is a nervous flyer, even though she does it regularly for work. If I couldn’t be there with her, then at least I could try to be through music, and the Spotify playlist I made for her flight home seemed to do the trick.

Even when Poppy was completely jet-lagged, she reminded me how much she couldn’t wait to see me. 

As soon as she landed at Heathrow, we made an official date for a few days after.

Nine hours later we returned to hers to cuddle and slow dance, and eventually, as she walked me to the station, we held hands before kissing goodnight. 

On my way home, I felt like a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. Maybe there was light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe dating had its payoffs after all. 

Over the course of the next few weeks, we spent every minute we could together, growing closer and sensing there was more to our connection than just a brief fling. 

I cried after that, feeling like an idiot for letting something so new affect me so much. But, as ridiculous as it may sound, I felt that this single WhatsApp message could change the course of my love life, forever. 

I could tell Poppy felt the same way, later telling me that she’d spent two days desperately trying to apply for jobs in London so that we could continue dating. To her, the only reason to bother staying behind was for me. 

Still, while she panicked about her future through endless pro-con lists, I tried to be as supportive as possible, all the while finding it increasingly difficult to mask just how gutted I was to lose her. 

It felt like a monumental loss then, and it still does now.

I’m still surprised I didn’t cry when I left her at Heathrow. When we parted ways, we both agreed that we’d focus on the present and not the future, but I know we were trying not to let the other see how sad we each were.  

A few months on and, I’m pleased to say, we’re figuring out how to navigate things long distance without putting pressure on one another. The WhatsApp chat remains active day to day, chatting about our days, sharing snippets of what the other is missing.

We’ve both agreed that the other is allowed to date whoever they like until we reunite, but this is a lot easier for me on land with the dating app world still at my fingertips. 

Yet without knowing when I’ll see her next – Poppy will be gone for at least a year – it’s difficult to keep communication going.

Even so, neither of us is ready to let go yet. 

Our perfect first date was the springboard for something bigger than either of us expected and I plan to find out exactly what that is. 

*Names have been changed

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