We Found Love in a COVID Place

Alexa, play We Found Love by Rihanna ft. Calvin Harris

Caricature of Mariah Cowsert

By Mariah Cowsert

January 13, 2022

It all started with a message on a dating app. Once our conversations got longer, we moved from messaging in the app to texting then after a fun phone call about life and how we were coping with the pandemic we decided to have a virtual date over FaceTime and finally…we had a true (outdoor!) first date. This act of digital courtship is how I met Joshua, my now long-term partner, who was welcomed into my roommates and my small COVID bubble during the early fall days of 2020.

Although finding love (or a hook up) in the time of COVID-19 has called for more intention, virtual dates, and talks about boundaries than the “before times”—more young people are looking for romantic connections online than ever before.

According to a report from YPulse, 40% of 18-39-year-olds say they’ve been using dating apps and websites more often since COVID-19, while 43% of people who are 18+ have been dating exclusively on apps and websites since the pandemic began.

All young people deserve to feel confident and safe while navigating relationships, sex, gender identity, and intimacy in COVID times.

And while maybe not everyone will find the love of their life on Tinder during a global pandemic like I have, all young people deserve to feel confident and safe while navigating relationships, sex, gender identity, and intimacy in COVID times.

In #COVIDLoveStories, we hear straight from young people what it was like:

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A post shared by Healthy Teen Network (@healthyteennetwork)

We created the #COVIDLoveStories campaign to support adolescent development during the ongoing pandemic by promoting real, tangible ways youth and young adults can begin, build, maintain, and even end intimate relationships while physically distanced. We believe in keeping youth at the center of our work, so this campaign is built around their real, unfiltered stories. 

Read more from young people about their most hilarious, devastating, awkward, frustrating, and fun moments.

Follow along with these stories and more on our Instagram channel, @HealthyTeenNetwork, as we share more #COVIDLoveStories throughout the month of January!

Mariah brings an artistic lens to nonprofit communications in her role as Digital Content Creator. With the bulk of her experience working in social services and at affordable housing organizations—she has a passion for diving deeper into (and helping bridge the gap between) health care and housing. In her free time, Mariah can be found tending to her growing jungle of houseplants, making collage and textile art, reading Mary Oliver poems in nature, and experimenting with new vegetarian recipes. Read more about Mariah.