Everyone comes to CatholicMatch with a past and for some those bruises can be harder to heal than for others. At its heart is the question “Am I really worthy of a good Catholic spouse?”
Alaina was confronted head-on with that question. The girl in her late 20s had already been through some rough patches when it came to romance. Six relationships had come and gone, and left her increasingly skeptical of the idea of finding true love. What’s more, true love wasn’t even something she dreamt of—“ I never pictured myself with Prince Charming,” she said. “My Barbies never got married to Ken…they were more like characters from Sex and the City. Ken was around, but he was more of a side character. He was there when Barbie wanted him around. ”
In spite of this skepticism toward lasting love and commitment, Alaina not only got into relationships, she fell in love hard. And each failure chipped away at her heart, leaving her increasingly hardened.
Deep down, she wanted someone and she wanted to be happy, but already on the way to being jaded, she didn’t believe it was out there. The advice she got not to “settle,” made her laugh. “Settle for what?” she wondered “It was some pretty slim pickings out there and I felt that regardless of who I dated it really didn’t matter.”
At the age of 27, Alaina ended a bad relationship and decided to go off on her own. Finding herself initially put her down the wrong path and a series of bad decisions put her behind life’s eight-ball. One day a coworker encouraged her to get online and try CatholicMatch. Coming from a large Catholic family, Alaina joked that finding someone here would be her mom’s wildest dreams.
But there were doubts.
“I was no angel,” she said bluntly. “I had made my fair share of horrible choices, especially lately. Why would any guy of value or standards want to date me?”
Alaina found she had been selling herself short. After getting on CatholicMatch she found someone (whose name she would prefer to keep private) who was very much like her father. It took time for her let her guard down after so many previous hurts.
But bit by bit, she saw how much this man cared for her. "He wanted me to follow my dreams, and he wanted nothing in this world more than to see me happy…I loved this man. I saw my future when I looked into his eyes.”
Unlike other relationships, Alaina actually fought this one and tried to resist falling in love. But real love overwhelmed her doubts and healed her broken sense of self-worth. What this one man gave her is a window into what God offers everyone.
There’s an old saying that the Catholic Church isn’t a sanctuary for saints, it’s a hospital for sinners. In many ways, that is true of CatholicMatch as well, as broken human being search for the person to make their journey of salvation with. Alaina started her new journey with her wedding last September.
