Daisie Dates - EP15| Dating with ADHD

Episode Date: October 26, 2023

Welcome back to an episode where I admit a few things about myself I haven't said out loud before! We chat about finding your person, overlooking 'looks' on dating apps and how to be better on dating apps. In this episode 15, Jamie Johnston, Founder of Mattr. joins me. If you have ADHD or are dating someone with it, there's snippets of this episode that could be really helpful for you. We also cover dating struggles with men versus the struggles for women and how the traditional relationship can be slightly unobtainable for Gen Z's now, with home ownership getting harder, their flexibility with dating and being more fluid with dating and their love lives. Infact in 2023, a study of 4,000 18-to-25-year-olds showed that 41 percent are open to or seeking non-monogamous relationships on a well known dating app. The dating industry is growing and there are more single people than ever before, as more and more people prioritise their career over monogamous relationships. Mattr. is an app with the tagline 'Date different.' Mattr. are encouraging us to be more inclusive, let our guards down, get vulnerable and be more open, whilst dating with a lot less choice and more intention. There will also be a panel discussion you can attend if you are a member- 'Dating Apps - more Harm than Good?' on 4th October 2023 at Soho House. Grab a cuppa and stick in and let me know what you think!! P.S This is a relationships and dating podcast which is in the podcast charts. I cover mindset, heartbreak, rewiring thoughts and we chat all things finding love, aswell as finding ways for being happy single and embracing dating, choosing to not date at all or just having fun!  Follow everywhere @daisiedatespodcast and @daisiebelle PLEASE like and subscribe or leave a review - every little helps and this podcast is produced, presented, filmed and edited by me. Enjoy the episode!! Dais xo Follow me: Insta: @daisiedatespodcast | @daisiebelle TikTok: @daisiedatespodcast | @daisiebelle6 Follow @mattr.social

know what I got know what I want boy don't get me wrong sure we're having fun hello welcome to the daisy dates podcast where we talk all things relationships mindsets dating obviously and dating apps as well which we're doing today I'm in the studio with Jamie Johnson founder of matter which is a new and inclusive dating app. Welcome to the studio. Hi Daisy, thanks for having me. So good to have you. I've been following Matter for a little while, so it's really nice we've made this little connection and you're here today. I always start the podcast with a little bit of a this or that game. Yeah, feeling ready?

Yeah, go for it. Okay, so when dating, tickets to a live gig or tickets to a cinema? Gig, definitely. Absolutely. A picnic and each person like brings something or a sit down dinner date? I'm going to go with dinner actually on that one. Are you? Yeah. I'm surprised at that one actually. Okay, how come? I just feel like with a picnic sometimes you can get a little bit like, oh, there's mud there or you don't know about the weather, you know, you plan it, you chuck it down with rain.

We live in the UK, right? So yeah, just book the dinner for me yeah i like that a cycle or a long walk long walk for sure a long walk you can talk more on a walk you're not like covered in sweat uh so yeah i love a long walk i'm a big fan of a walk so yeah absolutely okay if you were to see something live would you go for comedy or drama oh i like both uh but comedy if it's a date. Yeah, especially first one, I reckon. Defo. In the talking stage, phone calls or texting? Good question. I'm going to go with texting and then leading to phone call.

Nice. And sharing food, like tapas style or separate meals? Depends what the food is, doesn't it? Yeah. Do you know what I mean? If it's like Indian I feel like Indian and Chinese and tapas you kind of want a bit of everything because there's such a big menu whereas like if you're having a steak or you know and someone's having like a piece of fish then

yeah so again sorry to sit on the fence but uh depends on the meal yeah fair enough I'm gonna go pure tapas style I love like all the extra dishes I like doing that I think it it's kind of a little bit intimate but I think it creates conversation if you're worried about conversation I always kind of recommend a tapas style day because I think just it gives that conversation about the different foods and lastly judging by what you said to the about the walk I think I might know the answer but city date or countryside date yeah again I'm going to kind of sit on the fence on this one too. You know what I'm actually just going to say city date because I went to Bristol this weekend and it was just

amazing. I highly recommend if you've never been to Bristol it's probably my favourite city in the UK. There's so much to do there. You can even get a good countryside bit into that if you go down to like Ashton Downs. So yeah for me I'd say city date but then try and venture out into the greener parts of that place. Okay I've actually never been to Bristol. Amazing place. Always wanted to. Okay, let's get to know you a little bit more then as the founder of Matter. What's your experience with dating apps yourself?

So yeah, I was about 21, 22 when Tinder came on the scene. And I remember it quite vividly because I worked in an office back then. I worked in event management and I was one of only about five or six boys in a company of about 60 women or something like that. And it was just an explosion of them always talking about Tinder and going on dates. And there's this new app. So I was right at the beginning of that. But what was so great, I feel, I don't know if it's so great, but I kind of grew up without any apps. And then when I first moved into London to work, that's when they came out.

So at the beginning, my university and kind of at college, it was all kind of, you know, old school, you know, talking to girls in bars and meeting people on nights out and all that kind of stuff. And then when I became an adult or, you know, became an adult, but, you know, started working, that's when the apps came came out and then that really kind of changed the game uh in a you know you could meet people from all over the city and I think I know I know we're going to get into it dating apps get a very bad rep but there's certainly a lot of positives to what they've done

um and I'm sure we'll get into that later but um yeah my experience of them is it's only as a 22 year old and then I was on them for you you know, on and off, you know, relationship here or there until I was 31. And now, yeah, I've been in a relationship for the best part of two years from an app as well. Oh, very good. OK. So your your experience dating with apps and off apps has been quite pleasant. Yeah, I think I think I think so. so yeah I think there's there's times where you have a bad app date there's times where you have a bad non-app date um you know I've I've never you know there has been a couple of occasions on on apps where you know things um you know a bit weird or a bit different to how they might have been but I would say over you know if you look at all of it

as a whole my dating experience has been you know, fairly good, both on and off apps for the, you know, give or take 10, 11 years that I was, you know, dating. And do you think that dating has got harder as you've gotten older? I think it really depends. Yes. I think when you're getting older, people are much more sure about what they want. And I think that's, that's, that's good, because you know that that person, if you're if they if they have got what you want, then you're probably going to do better with them. It's not so much test and learn as there are when you're there is sorry, when you're when you're younger, but it, it kind of shortens the pool of people if they're, you know, they're so kind of focused on this or so kind of focused on that. And I suppose, when you are getting into your kind of later 20s, earlier 30s, there is that kind of settling down kids, you know, moving out of the city kind of conversation that people are either ready for or some people are not. And so I think that, yeah, it does shorten the pool a little bit. Or then you have the other option, which is that you just date someone younger who's not ready for that, you know, and that's kind of what I see a lot of kind of friends of mine doing at kind of my age is probably going, well, I'm not mature enough to kind of be the kids, you know, settling down so they have girlfriends that are in their kind of mid-20s

rather than in their later 20s. But I do think it's definitely got a smaller pool. I'm really finding that. So I'm 28 as a woman that would be ready for kind of everything. And then I'm finding that men that are like generally 31, 32, 33, they're going back to dating 23-year-olds. Yeah. Because they can do that.

Women can't do that so much. Yeah. It's really, really interesting. I mean, this isn't anything new. This has been, you know, since the dawn of the ages, men have, you know, dated, you know, women that are kind of, you know, younger or whatever it is. But it is funny because men mature a lot later than women in general.

So, you know, a 28-year-old woman like yourself, you might actually be like male maturity of like a 35-year-old. So technically you're dating a 31-year-old, he's actually less mature than you are now. So it's kind of a funny one because our brains, I think, just actually mature later. So, yeah, I can see exactly where you're coming from on that one. Do you think that there's a little bit of a gender gap right now?

Like has dating got harder for men? I think dating's got harder for men and women, but for different reasons. I think women are just overloaded, I think, with choice on apps, if we're talking about apps. And I mean, there's just so much choice for women. I mean, 70 odd percent of most users of dating apps are male um so you know everyone majority of people you're coming up against are going to be you know going to be male so for women that's just there's

more choice and what what that means is they have something called the paradox of choice which is where they think negatively about the options they're given because they have so many options and to give you an example of that what that means you'd say you go to a restaurant and the menu is packed full of choices you think the food's rubbish right whereas if you go to a restaurant there's like three or four things on the menu like oh this is going to be great so women just become more i don't really know what the word is here not really picky but they they have more filters they've they've they put more guards up because they're dealing with so much choice. And that means that they end up all kind of fighting over the same guy.

So to give you some stats, because I know we mentioned this before, that you like data and stats, and I'm a big fan of the numbers. So 80% of male profiles, 80% women find unattractive, which is a crazy amount. So 80% of all men that women see on dating apps, they find unattractive, which means they, by, you know, doing the math, they only find one in five men, you know, attractive, which means that all of these women are fighting over these 20% of men, which means that some men do really, really well on dating apps. So they do amazing, like they clean up basically. I don't know the exact start of this but it's something like 15% of men get 90% of the matches something like that which is it's something like that don't don't quote me on that one but it's

something around that around that number so so women do find it harder because they're it's very competitive for them with the men that they want and men are finding it harder because they've got to kind of spread out. You know, they have to like as many people as possible, you know, and, you know, go out there and kind of get out there much more than women do. And I think there's hundreds of millions of studies you've seen where you'll just watch, you know, women swiping and men swiping,

just see the difference in how many matches. I think I saw a piece of content not that long ago where a woman set up a Tinder profile or it might have been Tinder and she didn't even have a picture of herself. It was just, I think, a picture of like a table and her like feet on the table. And she got like 15 matches in that day

and the guy got one. And he had like a whole created profile. So it just shows you it is becoming more difficult, but for different reasons. Yeah, the standards are different yeah from what women want compared to what men want and that kind of is just a fact as well like even when I'm dating someone um I am dating someone now currently and when I've kind of mentioned oh this was really important to me or the fact that you do this was really important

he was like what he didn't really know what was necessarily important to him that he was looking for he was just you know going if we get on and we have fun, that's great. Whereas I'm thinking, okay, you probably need to want kids. You kind of need like a long-term plan. You're thinking of like where you might want to live. All of these things are going through our heads. It's absolutely crazy. An interesting thing I did hear on a podcast,

albeit it was American stats, but it's going to be quite similar for the UK too. It was on Stephen Bartlett's podcast. And he had a guest on that was saying we're creating a world of like lonely men so those those x amount of people that do well great they're thriving they're getting a lot of sex meeting a lot of girls they're loving life but then you get that other percentage that aren't getting any matches so it's kind of degrading them and making them have low self-esteem yeah and that creates quite a dangerous type of man which is the lonely man maybe you know living

in his living at his mum's and and just feeling really lonely for sure and that that that's quite dangerous well yeah I mean that's you know that's just kind of like what dating apps have done is that you know the the kind of elite men really clean up and the vast majority, and I'm not even talking, you could be in the top 60 percentile and still not be doing as well as, you know, as I said, you know, 15 or so percent get 90% of the matches. So you could be in the top 60 and still not, you know, do very well. And, you know, you just need to look at the, you know, it's really sad,

but the biggest killer of, you know, young males is suicide, right? So, you know, a lot of men can go through their whole life completely unnoticed. And I think that's something that, you know young males is suicide right so you know a lot of men can go through their whole life completely unnoticed um and i think that's something that you know i'd really like to draw attention to a little bit is that like for a lot of guys they can be completely unnoticed on on apps in life in nightclubs um and i think a lot of people don't really realize um how lonely that can be um so it is yeah it is very very sad and very tragic and also on the other side of that thing is you can create a lot of anger in people too because they're not getting what they want and then that side of the coin is obviously something that's really negative too where you're creating

this kind of cohort of just really angry men that you know they'll find something to vent against right so it's it is quite a serious uh serious thing yeah welcome the incel that kind of thing happens yeah um yeah it's really really hard so I know that with matter you're trying to kind of help all of these issues as much as you can yeah um but before we get into that as the founder when was it or why was it you got to a point where you were like right this is what I want to do and this is what I want to create? Yeah. So I left university and I worked in, you know, the advertising kind of creative industries for, well, it would have been, yeah, best part of 11 to 12 years.

So I've always been around kind of social media and seeing things, you know, pop up and then we have to learn about all of them and sell them to clients and, you know, worked a lot with, you know, advertising and getting stuff out there and this, that, and the other. So I kind of know the behind the scenes of how algorithms work a little bit. I worked in tech. Anyway, I was one of those people that got put on furlough for the whole of the pandemic, ended up losing my job.

At the end of that, they kind of cut basically the majority of the team, and I was interviewing for for new jobs ended up getting this um really great job where I was going to be kind of it was a big company that was setting up another company within that company so it was like a startup in a bigger company if that kind of makes sense yeah um and they wanted me to come in and like head up the sales and and the growth and you know you should I should have been buzzing about it right 10 months of kind of watching YouTube or learning how to make Wagamamas at home.

And now I've got this great new job and I was back out there because I loved my job before when I was working in tech. I was working in influencer tech sales. And I was the complete opposite. I was like having complete breakdown about it, freaking out I was going to be useless, like hyper-focusing on failure.

And, you know, it was just a pretty traumatic time before I before I took the job on and at this point where I was kind of like look this is a bit more serious and kind of you know just being a bit nervous um so I spoke to a psychiatrist at this point and was like you know talk to him about how I was feeling which I think a lot of men should do that if you are feeling like it's a bit on top and overwhelming do talk to someone you know problem shared is a problem halved um and they and and the reason I did that I didn't kind of just jump in and say I need to talk so I goes as my whole life I thought I've had ADHD and I know that ADHD is a very kind of in vogue thing at the minute um but I've struggled with the symptoms of ADHD ever since

I was a kid um and I've tried to get diagnosed before I'm not going to go into the story about why that didn't happen but in typical ADHD fashion, all the paperwork I was meant to send to them, I put in the post box and I didn't put like, it was like a really heavy paper and I didn't put the right thing on it and it went to the psychiatrist and they never got it. And so I told my mum that I didn't have it

because she lent me the money for the diagnosis. So mum, sorry. Because it's private. It was private. It's very expensive yeah private so yeah I mean they should have just diagnosed me then I mean I just went and chucked it in with like a second class stamp and it probably weighed about six seven hundred grams so oh yeah so then I kind of had to live from like 24 25 knowing about all this condition all the way to 31 or whatever it was struggling with all the symptoms and not being able to access the help. So anyway, I was diagnosed fairly quickly, I would say,

but went through all the kind of the rigmarole around that. And I was really, you know, I always give an analogy about my diagnosis, which is it's like someone taking a backpack that's full of weights off your back. Because now you can kind of understand, you know, why I was like that at school, why I got in trouble for this, why I feel anxious about this, why I can't sleep. You know, then you get access to help, support and medication. I think before you actually get told by a professional, you have a condition.

You always kind of feel a bit like an imposter, like, oh, I've got all, you know, I've got all the symptoms, but I don't have the accreditation or whatever. And so you're always kind of on the periphery of, of, of getting the information and taking it all in. Um, the medications dramatically helped me. Um, you know, it's, it's not, you know, some people don't take it, that's their choice, but it's, it's definitely helped me. And I was very, very comfortable with talking about ADHD or like learning about, you know, who I was or how I could kind of better myself in the workplace and I was very comfortable like I am with you nowadays you're just saying like I've got ADHD I'm cool

with it but I just wasn't on dating apps and I was some form of barrier where I'm like I can't write this down people are going to judge me like I just did what the vast majority of people do on dating apps which is mask they just put you know look at my five best pictures and everything's amazing and you know I'm so witty and humorous and you know and you know I you know I like to say I'm witty and humorous but it's kind of it's very forced right dating apps feel very forced it's like create this amazing picture perfect version I've got absolutely nothing wrong with me which we know in every single person in the world that's not true and put that forward and I think the reason for that is one as we've just mentioned we know how competitive they are especially for men especially

for men well and women as well but men know that the vast majority of the users on there are other men and also I think that even if you don't have a very good understanding of technology you understand that algorithms are competitive and you understand that, you know, you're getting scored or, you know, something's happening in the back end that you're, you know, that what you put into it is going to feed into the algorithm. So that's where the idea of it came from, because if you look at dating apps, of course, you've got your generics, your Tinder, Tinders, Bumbles, then you've got your kind of, you know, more niche ones, you know, there's religion-based, sobriety, single parents, then you've got the kind of quite wacky ones you know that you mentioned their countrysides there's a countryside

dating app yeah I can't remember the exact name but it's for like people that like you know getting money and you know and uh farmers and that kind of stuff um and I was just like desperately looking for like an app that was about like honesty and kind of just basically no bullshit basically an app where you could just be yourself without kind of fear fear of judgment and also kind of just basically no bullshit, basically, an app where you could just be yourself without kind of fear of judgment and also kind of discuss things a little bit, what's going on in your brain and not feel that someone's going to, you know, kind of judge you for that or think, oh, I'm going to give a pass to that person.

And there just really wasn't anything out there. And I suppose everyone has ideas for businesses all the time and they're just like oh wow okay cool that would be a great app I mean how many times have you been at the pub and someone went I've got a great idea for an app and then they just forget about it but I just couldn't let it go okay um and so yeah that's that's kind of the very long-winded um kind of how we got to starting matter I guess your background in tech kind of helped because obviously what if I've thought oh this would make a good app the idea of being like how do you even start an app is like absolutely clueless to me. We mentioned just now before we got into all of that how you

were quite worried to approach ADHD on dating app profiles. Yeah. Is it something that you feel is necessary in a dating app bio? Yeah, I think it's very important to be upfront and honest about who you are as a person, because you everyone in this day and age is so busy, Daisy, right? You know, everyone needed something done yesterday. So don't waste your time trying to go on a date with someone that's not going to be compatible with you. And you don't know that they're not going to be compatible with you anyway but at least give yourself the best chance you know having ADHD and being in a relationship with someone with ADHD is it's quite a lot um there's a lot of highs there's a lot you know there's lots of lows we're a different you know we have a different wiring up of the brain and I think that's really

you know needs to be said and for people to either learn more about it on the other side um but also for you to be comfortable going like if I either learn more about it on the other side um but also for you to be comfortable going like if I'm going to go on the date with a person it's helpful to to me or to us because we've told you so you know I mentioned before we did this you know before we did this podcast that if I look around the room it's not because I'm ignoring it's because what I'm thinking I I can't look at someone's face whereas that can happen on a date and then they could go oh that guy was so rude and now if you explain it before it means that I'm not nervous about doing it you know that I'm not being rude and it's it's all it's all kosher basically and it's not just ADHD it's it

can be a whole range of things you know it doesn't have to be neurodiversity it could be just you know uh you don't like crowded spaces or you know you would rather go to a pub than a club or you know whatever it is I feel there's quite a lot of things where people don't want to put stuff down on dating apps even though it means something quite important to them or it could even be like a really big red flag for that you know like you could go on a date with someone you're really against x y and z but you don't write it down because you don't want to like kind of ruffle feathers that's what we're trying to change is I think what's really

really important is don't look at dating apps as like a real big numbers game and I know that I know this is completely against like what people say right you know it's like oh you know get just more numbers more numbers more numbers we always say it matter be for someone not for everyone it's better to get one match in the whole month and that person's completely on your wavelength than get 20 that are not you're going to waste so much of your life talking to them or even money going on these dates you're going to get way less self-esteem from from getting that you might get the big kind of dopamine ego boost like oh yeah i got loads of matches but then you know you're going to meet them they might not call you text you back call you back you're going to feel even more negative so don't feel we always

say don't feel scared to put down like things that you might that might turn people off because they're the right people to turn off because they're not going to be compatible with you anyway. So, you know, you're saving yourself some time and that is something that you just don't see on the, on the other apps. So, um, so that's what we're, yeah, that's what we're really trying to do is get people to be open. But I do think it's very important to be, to put down things, especially like I can't cure ADHD.

So if you want to be in a relationship with me you're gonna have to deal with it for the rest of your and my life or whatever it is so yeah it's good to get that down so if someone matched with someone that had ADHD and they ended up on a date with them how can someone without ADHD help someone on a date that has it I think make them feel comfortable so if they if they've told you already that they have it you know make you know maybe like comment on it or something when you're talking to them on the app just be like oh I noticed you have ADHD you're probably going to know someone that has ADHD I mean everyone knows someone has it I mean we're five percent of the population so um so make a comment about it or

or be interested in it because you know one of the symptoms of ADHD is you know you're you like people asking you questions about yourself and all that kind of stuff so make them feel comfortable about it um before you get there and then pick a date which is gonna be fine for you to go on for a first date because there's gonna be dates that are probably gonna be better and worse than going to someone with ADHD on so anywhere where you've kind of got to sit still for a long period of time get that get that just in the bin for cinema absolutely not worst first date ever anyway I think we'll agree because what's the point yeah it's just pointless right awkward yeah it's just weird as well like we'll just sit there in silence in the dark um so don't go to the cinema um you know activities is really good like you know you know it sounds really cringing

but like you know like flight club or like crazy golf or something like that where you can move around so they don't have to kind of focus on you, like, because that can cause like, but certainly for me, that causes quite a lot of, you know, anxiety at the beginning. So think about the date you might want to go on, but also just make them feel comfortable about it. If they have a bit of an ADHD moment,

let them have it. If they look around the room or whatever, you know, it's always, it'd be great if you ask them like, you know, what are the things you're nervous about going on this date so that I can prepare myself for it accordingly so um communication is key always so yeah i'm a big big fan of communication i know that matter are helping with things like this so how is matter

helpful for neurodivergent people yeah so it's a good question so you know our app launched not that long a few weeks ago um so we're what what's called MVP stage, which is like the minimum viable product. So it's like the most basic version and we build out on it. So we were already one of the beginning to seeing like, okay, what stuff do we need in there right now? And what stuff can we kind of build in? So we limit the amount of people

that you can connect with a day. So, and we increase it as we get more users in. So right now I think it's four. What that means is like, you're not getting overwhelmed with choice. So ADHD, if we just look at ADHD, I mean, there's hundreds of other things, but you asked me specifically about ADHD, I think it's four. What that means is like, you're not getting overwhelmed with choice. So ADHD, if we just look at ADHD, I mean, there's hundreds of other things, but you asked me specifically about ADHD, I think, right? I could easily, and I did get addicted to things like Tinder, Bumble,

like where you're like, you could have a hundred thousand people if you wanted. If I did 18 to 40 in London, do you know what I mean? It's a hundred thousand people. And it's, it becomes like gambling and they use, you know, a lot of these apps use very similar software and techniques to to gambling companies so it's like you know put another five pounds in the machine pull the reel chuck a super like at that person so you know they can become very addictive and one thing I was like was like right I want people to slow down so the big mantra of matter it we're very you know we're fully inclusive to everyone you know we don't have a discriminatory algorithm so we match you purely on interest there's no scoring nothing nothing like that so

you only get matched on your preferences and your interest and we do a little really quick fire that we do this or that basically to answer 10 questions and it's fun stuff like marmite love hay pineapple on pizza then you know so it doesn't feel that deep then you can get deeper in in the bio and stuff like that so we so we only match you that. But one of the things we really want you to do from the top all the way is to slow down. Just take a minute. You don't need to match with hundreds of millions of people. We'll be having loads of different conversations. You need to have a few. So we allow you to connect with four people. I think as day that will be growing as we get, as we get larger and get more users. We don't allow you to connect with someone without writing to them so we want to get

rid of that whole kind of like just chuck a like there and just go to the next one so you have to send a message which means that you basically have to read the profile or look at the pictures because you're not just going to go like hey what's up but you can but it's not really great if there's no don't do that don't ever. I know. I've listened to your podcast episode before when you mentioned that. So we want you to slow down, to message someone. Because one, it means that you're actually taking some time to look at this person and what they're about. And two, it also means on the other end, when they receive that, that they know why you're interested in them. Because, you know, on the swiping out.

So we don't have swiping as well, by the way. You get given all four in one go. So you don't have to make a decision on someone we also allow you to save the profiles so i think it's really nice so if you let's say that i'm on the bus and i'm just on matter and i'm seeing this profile of this you know this this girl or this guy and i'm like oh they're cute like but then i get to my stop and it's like oh i didn't want to like close the app because i can then get rid of that person i didn't want to click yes or no because I hadn't read the profile. You can just click save and we'll save it in the back.

So that's so taking away so much anxiety from from the whole thing. So no swiping. You can save and you have to you have to message because let me give an example. Right. OK, I really love dogs. I'm just going to really generic. I love dogs. OK, and so if you don't like dogs, I really want a dog. It's basically like your version of a kid I think right I'm really excited about having my first puppy you want your first child and that kind of shows the maturity levels of men and women right now right so I don't really want if I was dating now I would you know if someone said like I really hate dogs or whatever that would be a huge red flag for me but because and everyone does this

by the way right you're on one of the swiping apps you just see their face you're like oh they're cute swipe and their profile could be like absolutely despise dogs and you've just swiped on them and so you're going to match with them and read and the first thing you're going to see is that and you're like this is a waste of time um so we make you open the profile you have to open the profile to even write the message right so you have to open that and then you have to write something so we're trying to just basically slow everything down and specifically for ADHD people, that works wonders because you're not getting like overwhelmed.

You're not playing like dopamine, you know, dopamine gambling or whatever it is and you're just taking a minute. I think it really helps as well because it helps people be less judgmental because you're not swiping and choosing because do you know how judgmental this makes you? Like a guy said to me recently,

like if a girl's bedroom is messy in the background, I'll swipe no. And he's like, what the hell? If I was at a pretty girl's house, wouldn't care what her bedroom looked like. Like this is how judgmental it makes you though. Like, oh, he goes to that bar. Don't really like that bar.

And it's literally that superficial when you're swiping and judging. And what I also like is you're basing it on traits, like being everything you've mentioned about matters so far is you're basing it on being honest, loyal and open and honest about yourself rather than matching people just because they like the countryside or just because they like drinking a lot

or just because they like something else. Because also matching people that are very similar to you isn't always the thing to go for. And that was only with a recent podcast where I guess that actually maybe you need to go for someone that doesn't like everything that you like. Because that can be different, can be helpful to and help conversations. So I like that you're basing it on traits rather than the hobbies in common. One of the real key features we have is called honesty box. You know, I'll ask you, Daisy, let's play, you know, let me ask you a question.

Flip reverse. I play the Uno card. so it's going back on you now. Something that you, you know, you feel that you're really good at. And that can be either a talent or something personal, like I'm really empathetic. And then something you feel negative about or something that you need help on. I know these straight away. Go ahead. So I have a natural way to make people feel quite comfortable. Like I think I have a naturally like warm aura.

That's why I do what I do. One of my worst traits is I'm very impatient as a person. I share that. Yeah, to the point it's really bad. And I've started dating someone that is so amazing with that. So someone was going 20 miles an hour the other day. When I was in such a rush and it was a road where you should be going 40 50 it was infuriating for me right and I'm like

oh my god just drive and he puts hand on knee and is like come on let's distract you um what did and he just completely took me out of it because I was losing my head getting so impatient I don't want to be like that it's just my negative traits so that would be my one of my favorite traits about myself versus one of my most hated about myself the reason we make people do this is one it's really great to be vulnerable it's great to kind of put you know like stuff that you need help on or stuff that you you know maybe dislike about yourself but it also allows the other person to be like oh I can help with that and people love helping each other so there's a thing called help High, which is like anyone can get it. It's legal highs.

You can go out and get high right now. Help Us High. Help an old lady across the road or, you know, and I'm looking for it all the time. Like I love doing it. Like it really gives me a buzz. People actually like doing that on dating too. They like helping each other. So I love planning things.

I'm that guy, right? I love planning things. Okay. I'm spontaneous too, but I like, you know, if we're going on holiday, I want to like be like, okay, I know what time we're leaving. I know where we're getting to. Like, you know, I'm that guy.

I want to check the travel reviews, go on TikTok, look for the cool spots. I'm not, you know, I don't want to just turn up and be like, oh, it's Saturday night. I haven't got a dinner reservation. I want to be kind of planned. And some people are completely not like that, okay? And some people are like, do it on a whim, sod it.

We'll work it out. So actually like going out with someone like me for them is is great because they're like oh actually my my partner likes doing all this stuff and I hate doing it and so you know I can leave him to do that and he's going to enjoy it so some of the things you actually might think negatively about yourself some people might be actually really looking for so you know we try and get people to do that. And because everyone's putting something negative down, they don't feel like nervous about doing it because every profile has got it right. So it's not like it's not like you're going to stick out or be odd. And so, you know, it's a really great thing to do. And every and also in that in that honesty box, you can put red flags in there like your red flags if you want, but also stuff that is just non-negotiables for for you and I think non-negotiables are they're quite important I think it's a very aggressive

sounding thing it's like non-negotiable but I wish we could just change the word of that but it is important to kind of have things that you won't kind of budge on and again a lot of people won't put those in profiles because they feel like you know I'm going to scare someone off or you know this it makes me come across a bit aggressive or abrasive but we allow you know I'm going to scare someone off or you know this it makes me come across a bit aggressive or abrasive but we allow you know we we've created a box for you to do that so we wouldn't have created a box for you to do that if we didn't want you to do it so that's that's where the honesty box side of things come in I love that I think it creates a place of people that are very self-aware which is really important to me to date someone self-aware because I'm like so self-aware of like all of my

greatest and worst traits and I like someone to be like that as well for sure self-awareness is key with the app can you see a clear difference from your app how men and women use it differently in even in the form of this honesty box can you tell the difference between how men and women use it differently yeah a little bit so I don't have any kind of you know really hardcore data on you know men and women how they use it differently for certain certain things but what I can say is like what I've seen because obviously I'm on the app I'm you know I'm very clear by the way that I'm in a relationship on the app like hey I'm the founder like I'm here just to make sure everyone's fine basically use me as customer support and so dating apps as I mentioned before are so heavily dominated by men they They are massively over-indexing on men.

And so Bumble, which everyone thinks is the female-first app, it's founded by a woman, it's got women make the first move. Their users are 68, something like that, in their late 60s percent male. So it's two-thirds near enough. What we're seeing on Matter, okay, it's a much, I mean, it's a minuscule sample size compared to what they are, but we're seeing very, very heavily dominated

the other way towards women. So I think the last check, we had something like 66% of our users were women and that marries up across social. It's not a behavior, but women are very drawn to our product. And I think it's really interesting. It's like, we were trying to create

a much better space to date where there's, you know know as equal as we can get it men and women so women don't feel like they're completely swapped with choice when men don't feel like they have to be so competitive because there's hundreds of other guys vying for the attention so how do you do that well we need you can see you need to get more women into these apps right and so how do you how do you get more women to those apps is will you change the whole concept and the behavior and everything about what you're doing so we you know we talk about vulnerability you know we talk about you know not being overwhelmed we talk about a lot of things that you know women are kind of they're more susceptible to from what we see we also work very heavily with brands so why can't we just extend this user journey why can't we help

people on this so anyone that's a member of matter there's a brand partner section within within within our app you can go in there and you can get all the stuff you need for for dates and we put like two like you know two or three new brands in in a month so for instance we know we work with a cosmetics brand the other day called pearl you know they did something all around like unmasking they and you know and we matched it up with what we're doing so you can kind of get ready for your day we have like health and wellness products we work with a lot of brands that are very synonymous with females as well and we give them you know incentives to be there so that again draws in draws in the females and also because we're spending time spending time with a lot of

female founders and understanding the trials and tribulations of women going out dating and you know it's interesting me talking talking to you like I'm a guy I And, you know, it's interesting me talking, talking to you. Like I'm a, I'm a guy, I'm straight, you know, straight male. So I don't really know what it's like to be in a woman's, woman's brain and be dating. And I can give you stats and data, but I, you know, I've got no experience like you have, like you have none for, for, for being guys. So we try to spend a lot of time talking to people that are going to use the product. And I think, why don't people do that? So if you want more women in the product go start talking about women about that how they date I would also say that women are not afraid to do a big bio a bigger a bigger bio which again by the way I'm all I'm all in favor of you know nothing annoys me more than uh seeing like a blank a blank bio so what we've done

to kind of to stop that now is that we we will not like let open the perks side of the app until you've completed the profile and that's not because we're trying to be some sort of task masters is that people can't talk to you you know like if we don't have any information if you've got one picture up and no information then you know the absolute bare minimum to get on the product like how's anyone meant to start a conversation with you so you know you're on this product to be serious about meeting someone in any sort of guise. And another thing, we're very open about what type of relationship you are looking for.

I think this is an absolutely fascinating and interesting topic is the shift in Gen Z about how they view relationships from kind of millennials. But, you know, we allow you to say like, you know, looking for something casual or you know looking for long term or whatever it is so again you can be really upfront about uh kind of what you're looking for and I think a lot of the guys profiles I'll see they'll just be like doesn't matter doesn't matter doesn't matter yeah whereas women will be like want this want this

yeah tell us about that shift that you mean from millennials to Gen Z yeah super interesting I absolutely love stuff like this. So Gen Z, obviously, is anyone, I think it's anyone born after around 97. So they were kind of like the real first internet generation. They grew up with the internet, right? So it came into their life. They've always had it.

So instantaneous things are just normal. Like back in the day, if I wanted to get a minicab in London, oh my God, it was like, had to call the number, you had to wait there. It was so dangerous, you know, just wait out in the street corners, like three in the day, if I wanted to get a minicab in London, oh my God, it was like, had to call the number, you had to wait there. It was so dangerous. You know, you just wait out in the street corners like three in the morning. Then, you know, you need to get cash out.

If you didn't have cash, you didn't take a card. Now it's just like Uber. We've grown up with Uber, Amazon Prime, Spotify, Facebook, music, everything. Deliveroo is the one that spins my mind. Like we had one pizza place where I lived in Southwest London. That was it. It was like go-go pizza or nothing. So now it's like, oh, if I want to have like like uh you know a full-time meal at three in the morning I

can do that um so they've grown up with kind of instant gratification everything's kind of coming you know coming to them quickly and they're they're very socially conscious they feel like they've been dealt a really rough hand you know with climate change which to some extent they have they've grown up through a lot of you know really bad things like you know, with climate change, which to some extent they have, they've grown up through a lot of, you know, really bad things like, you know, the financial crash and COVID kind of stole a lot of their universities. They don't view dating like we used to. It's kind of like, you know, monogamous, you know, meet someone, get married. Like that's kind of like the life path. Like, you know, you meet someone, you date, you stay together, you buy a house.

A lot of these things are kind of unobtainable for them. You know, home ownership, you know, forget about it you know I mean you need to be a multi-millionaire to do that or have someone that's going to support you so that's why they spend such money on material things or experiences so that kind of home ownership bits not really there they've kind of invented this situation ship you know where they're like kind of in between I don't really know too much but do you know I know about situations yeah i find myself in them a lot um it is when it's not really a relationship you're doing everything a relationship does but without the label the non-committal yeah i'd say it happens for three months um it's the three month marks

that first part of dating that could be getting serious but then normally it just stops after three months but some people can have situations for like a year or something but then that's about having if you don't want that that's about having boundaries put in place if you're not gonna make me your girlfriend or boyfriend by you know if we're not gonna have this commitment towards each other then I don't want to do it but if you're happy with a situation then it can be the best thing ever if you're both in a place where you want to meet up with the same person to you know maybe have safe sex and have that person to confide in after a long day but don't want anything after that it's a weird space it's a weird space because I feel like you should

just have a conversation about kind of having an open relationship or being non-monogamous because I feel like that situation is like I want everything that a girlfriend gives me but I don't want to be trapped into like not that that's for me otherwise I don't really understand what the point of it is but to be fair the term boyfriend and girlfriend scares me like I've been dating someone now for like a month and a half and that's that's like the best amount of time that I've had in a little while like I've been going on one two three dates and then that's it because I'm like just not bothered and now I'm like gosh this could really go towards girlfriend boyfriend and I'm I'm like oh I don't know how I feel about that yeah that feels weird

to me and that's like a definitely a commitment phobe thing from myself I've only recently kind of discovered I mean other people might think that's quite obvious because I'm 28 and I've been single a lot of it and just dating and having loads of fun but I yeah I'm scared of that term so I kind of understand it I don't know why that term brings so much depth to us but it just does yeah it's it's just I just think they've just created for something which is that they don't it's not it would have been called non-committal for us you know I mean they've just put a put a name on it but you're going to see so many more single people now than ever before as people prioritize career and women are going to be prioritizing career a lot more as they need more more money and kind of even having kids seems you know too expensive now you know it's really sad that people say well I don't want to have kids

because I can't afford them but it's it's true so you're going to see a lot more single people which means that dating apps are going to you know grow even more and more and Gen Z are much more happy with kind of like whatever you know they don't have to have that monogamous kind of you know trajectory so a lot of them are abstaining completely from sex you know like being like oh you know you know i'm just gonna abstain i think like if you look online you can see how much that's that's growing you know that used to be kind of just like a religious thing before now it's like people are like no but then on the other side of things people are so sex positive now i mean we're looking at things like um you know non-monogamy which i mentioned before and the rise of apps like field and pure and you know talking about going to a sex party now is completely like normal. Like, you know what I mean?

They're all over the country. So there's that side of the coin too. And it's kind of like whatever works for you. And I think what's really interesting if we look at Hinge is Hinge's strapline is designed to be deleted. Firstly, no one believes that, right? You know, no one wants you to delete their product. But the whole premise of Hinge, and they spent loads of money on this big ad campaign which is animation where this guy's kind of going through this circus and then in the end he meets this woman and they um they get together and then the hinge app on his phone actually blows up because they're now in this monogamous relationship and we're not needed anymore it's very sweet um and it probably would have cost a hell of a lot of money because it's all animation but now they're pushing this

whole non-monogamy route where they've kind of opened up, you know, conversations around being pansexual and having multiple partners. And it's like, it doesn't make sense. How can your app be saying designed to be deleted? And then you're just kind of chucking this on the top. And that's because there's a huge rise in Gen Z kind of looking at those types of relationships, which is what I kind of just think a situation ship is it's just like you have a primary partner or whatever and you have people that you might have you know flings with on site and I think 17 I think it's a 17% again don't quote me it's but 17% year-on-year increase in the term non-monogamy on on dating app profiles I can't

remember which one but it's a lot so 17% year-on-year if that compounds it could be 25% so they are looking at different ways of relationships people are more fluid now too on dating app profiles. I can't remember which one, but it's a lot. So 17% year on year, if that compounds, it could be 25%. So they are looking at different ways of relationships. People are more fluid now too. You mentioned pansexual, which means that you date anyone that can give you that romantic connection, right? So it's regardless of gender identity

or anything like that. So people are much more fluid and trying these things as well as non-monogamy as well. So yeah, Gen Zs are definitely more open-minded is that helpful for dating apps um yeah i think so i mean like you know we're inclusive to all different types of people and we're we've we're talking about non-negotiables like we've got non-negotiable to any sort of like hate or anything like that we're very very secure as a product you know i i kind of i say a lot about what i i see in other products and how they don't protect their users.

And we won't stand for that matter. So we're very strong on kind of the security side of things. But we have a range of different genders. You can identify with how you like. We won't tolerate any sort of kind of like hate speech or anything like that. We have loads of different ways to date as well. So you could say like looking for something right now,

you could say long-term, like short, but but looking for long whatever it is it all the communication is available there but yeah it's it's nice and again we're you know we're in our infancy so we you know and we're growing really like really rapidly so it won't be long before we can do some really big pieces of data because i'm really interested in looking at kind of straight and lgbt plus like splits and kind of, you know, looking at the data behind that. One, because I love data, but two, also just to see the different, you know, the different ways that different communities interact on the product. But it's obviously great for our product because, you know, we just want people to be open and honest about

who they are and if people are trying out being fluid for the first time or they might, you know, for instance, if you think you might be, you you know you might be gay jumping straight into you know jumping into a gay dating app where everyone is fairly you know fairly sure that they're gay and they're all there that can be quite daunting experience and and actually that is a it's a much more kind of cutthroat place gay dating than straight dating in terms of how they you know they're kind of to the point there um and so that could be quite a scary place to go so for us getting people to come onto matter and then that might be their kind of first step in the water that's great i would love that to happen if people want to use us as their kind of initial trying it out place

we're more than welcome to have those people here we welcome you massively and just going back to what we mentioned about gen z i know that you had a little bit of a post about this it was quite interesting and you spoke about tiktok and to be fair this is happening in every kind of age group with tiktok but gen z are quite prominent with their presence on an app like tiktok and do talk about you know there'll be there'll be a lot of girls that'll be like oh my god if you ask you want a coffee date girls do not go and all of that kind of thing which can be as you've mentioned detrimental to like mental health when it comes to dating etiquette yeah I got asked actually to give comment about seven or eight months ago for the metro newspaper about the golden retriever boyfriend and I'd never heard of

the golden retriever boyfriend have you heard of the golden retriever boyfriend no only when I read it on your blog so it's basically happy-go-lucky you know golden retriever type of guy dependable smiley smiley you know it's like the complete antithesis of the bad boy that you know that a lot of women desire or they i think they desire the actual the thought of it rather than the you know a hundred percent yeah um because you know oh yeah my boyfriend's oh he's in prison or he's you can't hang out with me tonight because he's a drug dealer do you know what I mean

it's not really it's not even that bad boy it's just the boys that are non-committal then bad boys that just never commit to you we're drawn to that and I don't know why

and for the first time ever I've really tried hard to like get out of that wiring of being drawn to such it's a chase right it's a dopamine thing so you know it's like you said

you've been desperately going you know not desperately but you know I mean looking at dates and and you know been trying to find someone then you found someone and now you're like oh no now i'm scared of the boyfriend name i am yeah so it's kind of like it's a dopamine thing and that's very much you know dopamine is an hd thing but it's for everyone you're chasing dopamine you know i mean that's why people do bungee jumping you know i mean these things can be detrimental when reading them and i think it's confusing to get all these opinions like, oh, like if you really like someone

and they want to take you on a coffee date, but young girls or boys or, you know, men, women are like, oh, actually TikTok told me that I shouldn't go on a coffee date. Yeah. My piece of advice on this, I don't kind of beat around the bush in this. Do not, under any circumstance, take any advice from social media about who you should date and what are trends and trendings um so what you're talking about there on

the coffee date is something called rules-based datings and it's basically like reading a 1950s american housewife magazine that's like oh you have 10 ways to bag this man you know that type of content from and it's much like you know if they offer you something that they just they deem as cheap ignore it because they should be taking you to you know the shard on the on the first day um you know if they you know only hang around in expensive places you know and stand by the bar and kind of it's very devaluing and it's so funny that you know the big movie this year's barbie which is all around female empowerment and then rules-based dating is basically saying like you know shut up your opinion's not not wanted I think what the point is here is not to kind of pinpoint everyone into

a specific type because you can get a lovely golden retriever type guy that's lovely and really patient with you and really careful with you in situations that might stress you out but then you also might still need them to be quite dominant in other forms of dating so you you kind of need the overall but also what suits you a hundred percent I think so I think it's pinpointing people into sections is what social media can do and I will caveat yeah I believe I do agree like don't um trust everything you see on social media but I'm quite good with using my social media in terms of I don't follow people that make me feel rubbish. I'm really good at who I follow.

So therefore I also follow accounts that are actual experts. So I follow accounts that are therapists, counsellors, maybe like healing therapists, and they give good advice from a place of expertise. Totally, totally agree. I think what I was trying to say there was trends and anything that's kind of like on your For You page that people are like, you know,

bantering about like a lot of the things that people say on social media, they do it for the, you know, the clouts, they do it for the likes and the views. But my advice is look at your values. I think that's really important. Look at your values, you know, look at kind of your strengths, your weaknesses and kind of match up with that. Like for me,

I don't care if you're the CEO of JP Morgan or if you work in McDonald's, like you could be a horrible person, have loads of money, and I'm not going to be remotely attracted to you. You know, I might be attracted to you in the, at the beginning, but I'm not going to spend my life with you. I think personality is so important. and that's something that dating apps it's you know it's really difficult for you to get personality across on your dating app but it's something that we try desperately to do because attraction is important yes looks are important of course and that's the initial thing you see on a dating app you go oh is that guy cute or that girl fit but you need to know about their personality because you can't stay with someone on their attract because they those looks one will everyone's looks fade

as you get older but they will become less appealing to you if you feel that they're a bad person personality is so important it is okay to say looks you know especially on apps i think majority of people are picking on looks uh at the beginning but that's what i think is so important for when you're trying to pick a partner don Don't go on social media and start picking, calling people golden retrievers or dashens or German shepherds or whatever they're called or thinking about rules. Because, you know, for instance, the rules thing, you might live in a small village. There's no fancy restaurant near you anyway. So what does that mean? You've got to be miserable your whole life. You're not going to get this elite guy or whatever. You know, people just say things without thinking about how they affect other people.

You know, you might not have the clothes to go into this place or, you know, et cetera, et cetera. So things which make you feel in any sense unnerved or devalued, then just ignore that. Of course, psychologists, psychologists therapists psychiatrists obviously I've spoken to those people in the past definitely listen to what they say hashtag golden retriever boyfriend forget about it the golden retriever that is hilarious I always wonder who the first person is that gets his trend and then suddenly it goes viral it's hilarious um okay then how can people get matter right now yeah so so matter is available um only in london for the time being the reason for that is that we need people to be near

each other to connect we are available on ios android is in development i'm very happy to announce that by the time this comes out we will start development which is very exciting so if you're on ios and you live in any of the london boroughs you can download us now android users hang hang on for a second i know that dating apps are quite big on actual real life events now too like making that community so is that on the cards yeah for sure so as i mentioned earlier we've got our brand partners section so we do a lot of stuff with brands so you can get really great discounts there on cosmetics health and wellness um you know fitness we're also just about to launch a really exciting partnership with a nightclub called be london they want to

open up the club before the clubs open and do like cool events in there so there's going to be themed cocktail making nights there so they're going to have like a james bond one they're going to do like a titanic one we do have one uh panel discussion coming up so we want to do things that are different so our strapline is date different and we want to try and do things that are exciting um if you are a member of Soho House and you would like to come along on the 4th of October we are doing a panel discussion at Shoreditch House called Dating Apps More Harm Than Good and we will be looking back at the last 11 years of dating apps and talking about their their impact on society and we've got an absolutely amazing panel um with psychologists uh people uh you know we're talking about social media trends we've got

someone there from someone there from tiktok myself and we also have a chap called stephan pierre who's the most liked man on tinder in the uk oh incredible yeah i've seen him yeah so he's in the the one percent of the% that get all the 90 matches. So you'll be able to actually speak to him directly and kind of see what his experience was like as a male that obviously cleans up. Does well. Did well.

Cleans up. He's now a relationship coach. Amazing. Wow, how Tinder changed his life. For sure. Incredible. Okay, so I always have a finale question and I was actually going to ask you advice on consciously dating, but you actually naturally gave us that earlier. So I've changed

the question, which is you're obviously in a relationship now, have been for a couple of years. So my question to you is what did this person do that made you want to commit to them and say yes to this person? It's a good question let me tell a little bit about my dating and then I'll get to kind of why this person changed that so I was out and about in London I you know I was having a lot of fun it was you know I didn't find dating a chore you know I was good at dating maybe we will say say yeah you know I've got ADHD so I love meeting new people new people to me it's like it's like kryptonite it's like my nectar right so you know dating out to meet loads of

new people go out but you know I was always kind of like uh something's missing or you know this and you know sometimes I was really kind of valuing looks over personality and I you know I've been on some of the most boring dates you've ever met with some you know really attractive girls but they were so dull and I was like dull dull to me but it might not be dull to me and then it was like then I was prioritizing low then I was like okay I need to do the personality then I didn't have the sexual attraction so I was kind of like oh nothing's really really hitting um and then I and then I met Sarah so Sarah and I met on um an app called Raya if you know what that is oh yeah I do yeah which is

really funny because Raya it's absolutely hilarious so Raya was set up so like people in the celebrity world could could meet each other without kind of going on to tinder or bumble or yeah how did you get who who recommended you um so I used to work I used to work in a influencer agency and you know we had a couple of Victoria's Secret models and stuff like that on there. Just recommend me a few. Yeah, I kind of nudged them like this. I remember actually doing it at this event. I was like, can you just get me into Raya?

And they were like, yeah, sure. Because for those that don't know, you need multiple recommendations to get on an app like this. Yeah, it's very, I think the stat is, and this is going to make me sound so big headed, but I'll give you a stat. It's more people apply to Harvard and get in

than get into Raya. That's crazy. Which is funny. That is funny. It is to keep it safe, of course, for like the quite famous people that go on it. I think, you know, it's a really great thing to do because, you know, if you're really, really famous,

I mean, I'm not obviously remotely famous, but if you are really famous and you go on Tinder, there's no way you're going to be vulnerable there. But the funny thing is that when we both met, we were unemployed, which is hilarious. So you've got two people that have like snuck in under the rope into this fancy app. And we met we were both on furlough or unemployed so I always think that's quite funny for the app that there's two people in there that are kind

of getting government handouts to go to go on their riot dates I was looking for someone that was really one attractive but for me on apps I had to be like are you going to fit in with my lifestyle and so this is what I always say to people, make sure that you have a range of photos that shows stuff you do. She went to festivals. I was like, yes, I like live music. She had a picture of her doing a speech. I was like, oh, she's confident. Like she can go up and stand and give a speech. She was obviously really attractive. And we got on really, really well on the day. And I felt very comfortable with her. And I was like, I couldn't wait to see her again. It was nice because I felt like for the first time when I'd been dating that I could just be myself. And I think that's really, really important. My mouth works about

seven times quicker than my brain. And I say stuff a lot. Sometimes I'm like, just trying to suck the word back in. And with her, I was like, I shouldn't have said that. Sorry. And she was like, no, it's cool. Don't worry about it. Just don't say it again next time or something like that. So she was patient with you. She's very patient. And I assume she doesn't have ADHD I don't know she's got a lot of traits okay um but naturally was patient allowed you to be

completely yourself is what I'm hearing here yeah I think we're both like that with each other you know Sarah has you know she's got a lot of traits that like I can help her with, you know, she, she has to focus on one thing, whereas I can do a hundred things at once. I'm quite happy doing that. So I can help her with those sorts of things. And it's been great, you know, to watch, I hate the word like watch people grow, but she's a lot more confident now than she was when we, when we first met, she come into her own a lot more and she, it's just about finding someone where you feel comfortable to be yourself. And I hate to sound like some sort of like cringing rom-com, but I just think you just know if that person is like one that you want to stay

with or not. Did you know quickly though? Well, so interestingly, we, we got out of lockdown, we met and then we went back into lockdown. So then it was, it was intense because it was basically like we were living together, but we'd only really been dating for three weeks and it was kind of like we were living together and I was kind of like oh maybe I need to go on some other dates to just as benchmarking

really but I just didn't want to and I felt bad on it like we were only we hadn't had any conversation about what we were but because we were just near enough living together I just felt bad I was like I couldn't really go on another date now kind of thing. And so we kind of were thrust into, you know, and that's kind of a weird way to do it. But it's either going to make or break you. You're either going to be like, I can't. And we did all of that second or third or whatever it was lockdown. We didn't rip each other's hair out.

And here you are. And also I think that lockdown relationships have been quite a nice reflection that there's not necessarily, there isn't always timings to stuff and things to climb for. Like sometimes you can just get thrown in and for situations, maybe one of you are from abroad or like you guys, you're in lockdown, you can have times where you actually do live together, even though it's not a big conversation of let's move in now. And that's okay.

Like I think it's important to note that relationships all have their different route, different journeys, different timings. And the second that you try and copy this okay like I think it's important to note that relationships all have their different route different journeys different timings and the second that you try and copy this like me have to date for three months before being boyfriend and girlfriend then you might be together a year or two then it's engagement then it's marriage we're out of that now so it doesn't exist anymore and I think there's there's some negativity to that but I think in lots of ways that it's also very very positive positive that you can just be like, this was thrown upon us and it's worked. So let's keep going. For sure. I think just do what makes, I said this before, but just do what makes you feel comfortable.

You want to sleep with someone on their first date? Sleep with someone on their first date. No rules. I'm all about that. If you want to wait to do that, then wait to do that. If you want to ask someone out in three weeks, you know, then fine. Do that. to do that if you want to ask someone out in three weeks you know then then fine do do that do whatever makes you feel comfortable because you'll know you kind of have to trust your intuition and

I think we're stopping doing that in the day and age of social media it's like someone tell me how I should feel just trust your gut yeah I mean that it's there for a reason right trust yourself more always trust the gut well thank you so much for joining me in the studio today. You can head to the bio to find out all the socials. And of course, you can follow me on Daisy Dates Podcast, TikTok, Instagram. You follow myself, which is Daisy Bell on TikTok and Instagram. And you can listen to the podcast wherever you go to get them, literally everywhere. And Apple as well. And you can watch on YouTube.

And I'll see you next time. Thanks for watching.