on dating during a pandemic

And in the end, we were all just humans, drunk on the idea that love, only love, could heal our brokenness – F. Scott Fitzgerald

I don’t wish to comment on the state of our brokenness – collective or individual. I don’t think that label is mine to give out. I do wonder though if we can agree to having felt more fragile this year. I know that the weight of the pandemic, of isolation, and of missed moments that could have been memories has made me feel cracked and vulnerable and exposed in new ways.

79% of us have found ourselves wanting a relationship more this year. So is Fitzgerald right? Are we drunk on the idea that love, and only love, will heal our brokenness or relieve our loneliness? Will a goodnight text help us feel less fragile?

These are questions I’ve been thinking about since March when I, and practically everyone I know, downloaded Hinge to relieve some quarantine boredom. What was I hoping to find swiping through these profiles? A partner for the end of the world? In many ways, it felt like “cuffing season” had come early, way early. Just as the loneliness of the winter months had started to wear off, quarantines were mandated and we were all back to craving togetherness. And so now, as the year draws to a close and we are deep into the “official cuffing season” I’ve found myself again wondering how we’ve collectively experienced dating and relationships this year. How has the pandemic changed how and who we date? Is dating forever changed? The following are musings informed by the answers of over 200 people to polls asked on my Instagram.

our relationship status (just in case you’re curious, reader)

53% of us are single. 33% of us are in a relationship. 14% of us have something in-between.

66% of us have a crush. 72% of us want a relationship right now.

This year … 18% of us have started a relationship. 9% of us have ended a relationship. 14% of us have experienced both the start and end of a relationship (though not necessarily in that order).

pandemic dating

70% of us feel as though the pandemic has had a significant impact on our love lives. And this number is more or less in-line with the findings of more, shall we say, official research. A study done by eHarmony in August found that 64% of daters felt as though they had lost valuable time to meet someone over the course of the year, and 67% blamed the pandemic for delaying their entry into a serious relationship. And while eHarmony’s data primarily points to the beginnings of relationships, I am sure that the pandemic has significantly impacted the ending of relationships as well.

69% of us feel as though the pandemic has changed how we flirt. Instead of in-person banter or playing off each other’s body language, the beginnings of relationships now often live on dating apps and Snapchat. People spoke of an increasingly digital dating scene.

50% of us are on dating apps though 78% of us admit we downloaded them because we were bored (not because we were genuinely looking to meet someone). 26% of us downloaded a dating app for the first time during the pandemic.

What is perhaps even more interesting than the fact that dating has gone digital this year, is that the pandemic seems to have changed who we date, the dynamics of our current relationships, and our priorities as we explore connections. People shared the following:

Honestly the pandemic made me realize I am LGBTQ! This is honestly a common thing, there’s literally a subculture on Tik Tok of women who discovered they are queer during the pandemic. Power moves
I am not standing for any bullshit any more
It’s revealed people’s true colors
I’m meeting people differently than just the party scene
People are way more up front about number of partners because of COVID
Looking for [partners] who seem stable
My long-term relationship has had to revert back to newly dating vibes

34% of us have started seriously talking to or dating someone during the pandemic.

57% of us have gone on a date during the pandemic. 49% with people they met on a dating app and 39% with people they already knew.

88% of us would not feel comfortable dating multiple people during the pandemic. 83% of us would not feel comfortable dating someone who was dating multiple people during the pandemic. 91% agree that if you are dating more than one person during the pandemic you should tell them.

66% of us feel as though the pandemic will have lasting effects on the way(s) we approach dating. I wonder if this is true. I wonder if I wish it will be true.

There a few things I know I hope will last beyond the pandemic. I hope we continue to be direct and honest with our partners or potential partners in the ways we have grown to this year. I hope we continue to raise our standards, to seek out decent people who treat us with the respect and love we are all so deserving of. I hope we continue to diversify the places we look to meet people (they aren’t just at parties). I hope we continue to explore our sexualities and seek out a love that is honest and unconditional.

But I also find myself thinking about what has been lost in dating this year. Dating in a pandemic, for good reason, seems structured and serious in ways that stifle spontaneity. This was a year for coupling, not for casual dating. I don’t want us to be mysteries to each other and I don’t ever want to trade depth for excitement, but I do wonder if, and kind of hope that, we may someday return to a more casual dating scene. A dating scene that lives less online and more in the streets and bars at the wee hours of the morning. A dating scene that involves slower introductions and physical touch and lets us have conversations without wondering how many people they’ve seen in the last week. A dating scene that is more serious than hookup culture but more playful or relaxed than what we have now.

they like me. they like me not.

So yeah, this probably does not have to do with the pandemic’s effect on dating. But these were fun questions to ask.

According to us:

If they text just to say hi or check-in, they like you. (68% agree)

If they reply to your story a lot, they like you. (71% agree)

If they facetime you, they like you. (73% agree)

If they ask you to go get coffee and not just hang out at their place, they like you. (73% agree)

If they remember random things about you that you mentioned once a while ago, they like you. (76% agree)

“The Eye Contact Thing”, they like you. (77% agree)

If they think about how their actions/words might impact you before acting/speaking, they like you. (81% agree)

If they make plans to spend time with you, they like you. (90%)

If they talk about you to their friends, they like you. (90% agree)

If they send “Good Morning” or “Good Night” texts, they like you. (91% agree)

70% of us are checking if certain people like our pictures or view our stories even though 92% of us agree it’s not that deep. As always, I suppose there is a difference between what we feel and what we know.

And so I guess my very unoriginal takeaway at the end of all of this is that dating this year has been complicated. And it has been complicated for each of us in different ways. Some of us have put relationships on hold this year – waiting until we move to new cities or meet new people. Some of us may have clung to relationships more this year – hoping to find some refuge from the heartbreak 2020 continued to deliver in the arms of someone special. Maybe most of us fall somewhere in the middle. And I don’t know how dating will change again in 2021 – if we will revert back to old habits whenever the world “is normal again” or if dating has fundamentally been changed. I suppose we will just have to wait and see.