Many other young people felt increased loneliness

As the pandemic has stretched onwards, the impact of loneliness and isolation that Hager felt has become widespread. How people understand their loneliness can sometimes be couched in further negative expression.

“Often people who are lonely have all kinds of things that they say to themselves. Negative talk. ‘No one wants to be around me.’ ‘How do I know no one wants to be around me? Because nobody called me all day,” said Dr. Chavis.

These results mirror a survey conducted by CNBC that found that nearly 7 in 10 young adults from the age of 18 to 23 were experiencing loneliness.

Dating apps have profited from this. Match Group, which includes major dating apps such as Tinder, Hinge and OkCupid, has seen a steady rise in popularity. After a slight drop in the first quarter of last year when the pandemic hit the U.S., the number of subscribers grew dramatically, ending the year with a monthly average of over 5 million.

Another popular dating application, Bumble, reported that paying users in the fourth quarter of last year increased to 1.27 million, a 42.5% increase compared to the fourth quarter of 2019.

"I want something to be there with me, a companion.”

For young people like Erlene Tuazaon, a 25-year-old student and receptionist, the balance between the support of friends and family and that of a potential companion isn’t always easy to explain or reconcile.

“Since the pandemic started, I was pretty lonely, like to the point that I was depressed,” Tuazaon explained, “It was to the point that I didn’t want to get up anymore, that kind of thing. But I remembered I have family, let me reach out to my family...I started talking more to my family, more to my friends.”

Despite that support, there was something missing. She had to explain to a concerned friend that turning to dating apps was less about the support and affection found in friendship and more about the search for something more consistent and more personal.

“Yeah, you could satisfy my needs in caring for me and loving me and everything. ‘But there are times,’ I told her, ‘I may need affection from somebody else. Not because you’re not giving me enough, but the fact that I think that this person could give me x, y, z...I want something to be there with me, a companion.’”

“We start to present, when we are lonely, ourselves in ways that the people experiencing us want to be by ourselves. And sometimes, the expectation is that the other would read our minds and meet us on this side of the fence,” Dr. Chavis said.

Chavis explains that the fundamental nature of our relationships have changed. Those close to us, perhaps family living in the same home, can feel too close. Those who we connect to online, without seeing them in person, feel too far. The pandemic has forced people to reconsider how they connect and what significance those connections hold.

Realizing what's really important

Kacey Quenzer, a 27-year-old buyer for a national power company, felt isolated quickly into quarantine. “I’m a social person, but I was also going through a breakup right when it hit, so that made it harder,” she recalls.

Even more, Quenzer had just moved into her own apartment – an accomplishment she celebrated, but also one that left her even more alone.

She turned to dating apps, particularly Hinge, to find distraction from her breakup and to escape from the walls of her one-bedroom in South Boston.

Unfortunately, she found it hard to make genuine connections on the app. Her surface-level or one-off interactions on the app made her “treasure the genuine connections” she’d already found in her life, “I’ve realized what matters more,” she stated.

What mattered most, she now understood, was her previous relationship. Quenzer and her ex-boyfriend, who lives in England, began communicating again. “We talked on and off throughout quarantine, but I was guarded because I was so hurt by what we went through before.”

In February of 2021, nearly a year into the pandemic, Quenzer had an epiphany. “I called him and told him I was all in.”

Quenzer notes that quarantine gave her and her ex-boyfriend both the time they needed to really think about what they wanted and to be intentional about moving forward. “We both needed to do some work alone to make this work as a couple. I’m not sure we would’ve gotten there if life had kept on as normal.”

In May, Quenzer will fly to England to reunite with him. They have a schedule of visits mapped out for the rest of the year. From there, they’ll figure the rest out, together.

Trapped by dating apps

Dating apps were the “only avenue to meet people” and “only source of validation,” for Thao Tran, a 24-year-old investment manager and teacher in Seattle. But Tran fell into the apps so much that she ended up risking her sane.

For Tran, who describes herself as a “huge extrovert,” loneliness defined 2020, even though she used Tinder, Hinge and Bumble throughout the pandemic.

Tran recalled at one point becoming obsessed with dating apps. The endless swiping made her feel like she was, “literally swiping on all of the population of Seattle.”

“I felt so lost, and I started verbalizing things where I'm like, I really don’t like myself. Like, I don’t know who I am. I don't like myself. It was really, really tough for me to do that.”

Eventually, Tran returned home to California, to friends and family. Through spending time with them she found emotional healing.

After returning to Seattle, Tran recalled how she almost went over to a guy’s house for a drink but stopped herself. “I actually ended up just sitting and drinking a glass of wine and writing all of my friends Valentine’s Day cards,” she said.

The pandemic has challenged long held notions of our relationships and how we connect. It has highlighted the issues born when self-esteem and self-validation are rooted in confirmation from others. And perhaps, for some, exposed the anxieties of being alone after having been alone for so long.

“I think that people seek that kind of closeness, a direct love relationship, that grows out of an ongoing feeling of isolation. The wish to be with someone. To know you are with someone...They wish for that oneness because there's a kind of paranoia of being alone. That oneness is about fighting that paranoia. About fighting the fear that one is left without,” said Dr. Chavis.

Whatever the “new normal” may look like for relationships, it’s clear that how they are formed, maintained and valued have changed. Whether striking up conversation in public social settings or through dating apps, the experiences of the pandemic may impact how those interactions are navigated. “Has this person taken proper public health precautions?” “Am I really ready to meet someone in person?” “How much longer can I be happy being single?”

Will people be eager and open to connect, like Cam? Vigilant about their health yet open to meet, like Emma? Will some still be uncertain about meeting in person, like Asha? Or perhaps, like Thao, find strong connections in familial and friendly spaces? “My emphasis on love right now is my friends and family because they’re giving that back to me,” said Thao.