Dear Reader,

Congratulations on your engagement!

You and I don’t know each other yet, but before we have even met we have shared a common experience. We have fallen in love and found the person we want to share our life with.

I love hearing how couples found each other, from the sweet and inevitable, to the strange, surreal, the serendipitous. Every story I have had the privilege of hearing, has had a beautiful magic to it.

My personal love story with my husband began in 2014. He and I had each just come out of decade-long relationships that weren’t quite right. We had both met our ex-partners when we were young and naïve and unsure of ourselves.  And now that we were older, (arguably wiser), and more aware of who we were, we knew what we were looking for and we knew what we deserved.

We were friends from work, and through our interactions there was always a mutual like and respect for each other and some great banter…but it wasn’t until our first date that we became aware of the chemistry, humour and interests we shared. They say opposites attract, but after years of each being with our extreme opposites, we were both craving someone who was on the same page. Our first date was the most fun night, just the two of us at his home, drinking beer, eating pizza, playing with a ball of blu-tak across the table and talking for hours. Neither of us wanted it to end…so it didn’t! TWO DAYS later we moved in together.

Since then we have shared so many fun experiences, travelled all over, supported each other through career highs and lows and health issues; we’ve laughed, we’ve cried, we’ve fought, we’ve made-up, we have been married, welcomed our first child into the world, and toured Australia for a year in a van with our little girl. I still pinch myself when I think about all the adventures we have been on together over the past 9 years, from the ordinary to the extraordinary. And I look forward to many more.

I love our love story. I also love learning of other peoples’ love stories. Everyone has a unique tale to tell. I get goosebumps every time I hear about the moment couples discovered their special someone.  Despite all of our differences, love is what we all share. It's the great unifier — our one universal truth.

I look forward to hearing about your special love story soon.

X

Jessica