Jan: “When Alan first sent me an icebreaker I was so excited, I was jumping up and down and I hadn’t even met him! I had seen his profile a couple of days earlier and I’d been immediately drawn to him. I’d actually been thinking of him and his profile for a few days. We started to send messages to each other through eHarmony but as it was the Christmas and New Year period we both had a number of commitments and our messages just seemed to fizzle out.

After the festivities I logged back into my account and found a goodbye message from Alan telling me that he was considering leaving eHarmony. As we’d been out of touch for a while I just assumed that he wasn’t interested in me but we continued to chat about eHarmony and dating. When I asked Alan why he was discontinuing his membership he said that at worst he’d hoped to find a good friend through the site and at best, to find a life partner and he was becoming disheartened as so far he hadn’t found either. Alan then told me that he actually assumed that I wasn’t interested in him when we’d stopped messaging!

Our conversations continued and we started a friendship. When I was sure I was ready to move to the next level, after many emails, I gave Alan my telephone number. When he rang me, we arranged our first date close to where I live in a little fish and chip shop at Surfers Paradise. We then went for a stroll to the markets in the evening, followed by a walk along the beach. Very beautiful. We were both very comfortable from the start, Alan was very easy to talk to and the conversation flowed.

As our relationship progressed, I introduced Alan to my adult children and they definitely approved. I also had the opportunity to meet Alan’s children and we’ve spent the past couple of years forming a true bond.

Everything has worked out perfectly. We both knew from the first online communication that there was definitely a spark between us. Alan is without a doubt my soul mate and I was just meant to find him. Alan is just as comical in real life as he was over email. He knows just how to tickle my funny bone at unexpected moments. As we live fifty seven kilometers apart, it is sometimes difficult to see each other but we accept what we can get. We’re both very tolerant and more importantly we’re very much in love.”