For the longest time, I was avoiding dating.

It started when my ex-boyfriend—who we will call Mr. Famous (because, duh, he was a celebrity)—cheated on me with an 18-year-old girl.

Are we surprised? No.

Was it heartbreaking and slightly life-ruining for me? Yes.

We dated for two years, and I loved him with my whole heart. I genuinely thought he felt the same way.

He did not. ❤️

After that, I decided I wasn’t going to date for a while. I was going to work on myself, focus on my education, become a better person, blah blah blah.

Very mature. Very healthy.

Except somehow “a while” turned into FIVE YEARS.

For five years, I used my education as the perfect excuse.

I don’t have time to date.

I’m too busy.

I need to focus on school.

And honestly, those things weren’t completely untrue. But now I’ve finished the most important exam of my life, moved to a new city, and suddenly I don’t have my favorite excuse anymore.

So... why not date?

But the idea really hit me after talking to one of my friends the other day.

She’s 36. Gorgeous. Successful. A pediatrician. She recently bought her own house. Basically, she did everything women are told we’re supposed to do: study, work hard, become independent, build a life for yourself.

Except now she wants someone to share that life with.

And she’s terrified she won’t find him.

She told me that several of the men she’s dated have said they prefer someone younger. Others want a woman who will stay home and raise their children.

Now she’s 36, looking for a husband, wanting children, and scared that after spending most of her life building the future she wanted, she might not have anyone to build the rest of it with.

And that conversation did something to me.

Because I realized I’ve been telling myself:

I’ll date later.

After this exam.

After this degree.

After I accomplish this.

After I figure myself out.

But when exactly is “later”?

So I started thinking...

Maybe it’s time to get back out there.

Maybe it’s time to search for my dream man.

Or at the very least collect some good stories.

So naturally, I entered the land of men: Hinge.

And I need you to understand something.

I hate Hinge.

I’ve always thought dating apps were for losers. 😭

I wanted one of those ridiculous movie love stories. I wanted to be standing in a bookstore, reach for the same book as a handsome stranger, accidentally touch hands, look into each other’s eyes, and somehow be married three years later.

You know. Normal expectations.

But unfortunately, it is 2026.

The bookstore man has apparently died.

So yes.

I downloaded Hinge.

And I’ve decided that this year, I’m going to date.

A LOT.

Different men. Different personalities. Maybe even people who aren’t normally my “type.”

And I’m going to document the entire thing here.

The good dates.

The horrible dates.

The men who make me question my five-year hiatus.

The men who make me wish I had extended it to six.

Maybe I’ll find my husband.

Maybe I’ll delete Hinge after 72 hours.

We will find out together.

But I do have rules:

1. Always meet in public.

2. No kissing on the first date.

3. No sex during the first month.

And most importantly, I’m going to try not to lose myself just because I decided to let someone else into my life.

So...

Tonight, I have my first date.

Five years later, we’re officially back in business.

Date #1.

We shall see what happens

.

No, I’m not about to tell you being an influencer is the hardest job in the world.

Because it’s not.

In fact, it was probably the easiest job I’ve ever had.

So whenever I hear influencers complaining about how hard their job is, I always think one of two things:

Either they’re lying.

Or they’ve never had another job.

So if the job was so easy…

what exactly went wrong?

As I mentioned in my previous post, becoming an influencer was my dream.

When I was a teenager, I spent hours watching YouTubers unbox giant PR packages, go on brand trips, attend glamorous events, and somehow make a living by posting online.

I wanted that life more than anything.

People made fun of me for trying.

Even some of my family and close friends didn’t understand why I was so obsessed with social media.

But I kept posting anyway.

Then, when I was 21, everything changed.

I gained over 100,000 followers in just three days.

Over the next four years, that turned into more than 2 million followers and over 200 million views.

Brands started sending me endless PR packages.

Some paid me over $30,000 just to post a few Instagram stories.

I got invited to exclusive events.

Celebrities started DMing me.

I was living the exact life I had dreamed about.

And I loved it.

At least, I thought I did.

The first thing it ruined was my education.

In my family, education wasn’t optional.

It was everything.

I was always the student with the good grades.

The one everyone expected to go to graduate school.

Then my social media blew up during my senior year of college.

At exactly the same time I was supposed to be preparing for my future, I suddenly had millions of people watching me.

Every morning there were thousands of notifications.

Brands wanted content.

Followers wanted replies.

The algorithm wanted consistency.

Instead of studying, I was filming.

Instead of reviewing lecture slides, I was checking analytics.

The scary part is…

I didn’t even realize it was happening.

Because social media rewarded me every single time I chose it over school.

More followers.

More views.

More money.

Meanwhile, my grades quietly dropped.

The consequences lasted much longer than the viral videos ever did.

Then I realized success doesn’t just bring fans.

It also brings people who genuinely want to see you fail.

At the time, I shared everything online.

Including the graduate schools I wanted to apply to.

Looking back…

that was one of the biggest mistakes I ever made.

People started emailing those schools.

Some questioned my character.

Some told admissions offices that accepting me would hurt their reputation.

Whether those emails changed anything or not, I’ll probably never know.

But I do know they changed me.

For the first time, I realized complete strangers had access to parts of my life they should’ve never had.

Even one of my academic advisors told me that some admissions committees might see influencers differently because they assume we’re more focused on social media than serious careers.

Maybe that’s true.

Maybe it isn’t.

But once people put a label on you…

it’s incredibly hard to convince them to see anything else.

Then I stopped knowing who was real.

The bigger your audience gets…

the harder it becomes to trust people.

Suddenly everyone wants to be your friend.

Some people genuinely like you.

Others like what you can do for them.

People wanted me to teach them how to become influencers.

They wanted introductions to brands.

They wanted invitations to influencer events.

Sometimes they just wanted to be seen standing next to someone with a following.

At first, I loved helping people.

But after a while I couldn’t tell who actually wanted to spend time with me…

and who wanted to benefit from me.

The same thing happened with dating.

Were they interested in me…

or the audience that came with me?

Once that question gets into your head…

it never really leaves.

Fame is lonelier than people think.

People assume having millions of followers means you’ll never feel alone.

The truth is…

success changes your friendships.

People you thought would celebrate you sometimes become the people rooting against you.

Friends talked behind my back.

Some made fake accounts just to leave disgusting comments under my posts.

Others laughed whenever something went wrong.

I lost a lot of friendships.

At first, it broke my heart.

Then I realized something Maybe I wasn’t losing friends.

Maybe I was finally finding out who never really was one.

The worst thing it ruined was me.

This one hurts the most.

Because I didn’t notice it happening.

I stopped enjoying life.

Everything became content.

“Let’s go to the beach.”

What should I film?

“We should visit this museum.”

Take a picture of me.

If the picture wasn’t good enough, I’d leave disappointed Not because I didn’t enjoy the day.

Because I didn’t get the content.

Somewhere along the way, I forgot why I started that page in the first place.

I started it because I was tired of everyone pretending to have perfect lives online.

I wanted to be myself.

Ironically…

I slowly became exactly like them.

I stopped asking,

“Am I happy?”

and started asking,

“Will this perform well?”

Every vacation became work.

Every dinner became a story.

Every memory became something I needed to post.

I wasn’t living my life anymore.

I was documenting it.

People ask me all the time if I still love being an influencer.

The truth is…

I don’t.

As I’m writing this, I haven’t deactivated my page yet.

But by the end of this month, I will.

Not because I hate social media.

Not because I regret everything it gave me.

I’m grateful for the opportunities.

The people I met.

The places I got to see.

The experiences I’ll never forget.

But somewhere along the way…

I stopped recognizing the person behind the account.

This isn’t me running away.

It’s me trying to find the version of myself that existed before followers became my identity.

Maybe one day I’ll come back.

Maybe I won’t.

But for the first time in years, I want to live a moment without wondering how it will perform online.

I got everything I had ever dreamed of.

And somehow…

it cost me the person who had the dream in the first place.

Have you ever gotten the ick from yourself?

Because I did.

Recently, everything I do seems to give me the ick. Which is slightly inconvenient when the person giving you the ick is with you 24/7.

First, I thought I hated myself, but hate was too strong for the feeling I had.

I used to be a passionate girl, full of life, who was not fazed by people’s opinions. Don’t get me wrong, I am still passionate about the things I want, but I feel like when I finally reach them, I don’t want them anymore.

Very healthy. Very normal.

So I decided to change that, and today I’m sharing the things I’m going to do over the next year to gain myself back.

Or at least become someone who doesn’t give me the ick.

1. Deactivating my Instagram page

When I was 14, I used to see influencers on Instagram, and I wanted to be one of them.

So I started posting, and suddenly, when I was 21, my Instagram blew up. Now I have more than 2 million followers across different platforms.

Fourteen-year-old me would probably pass out if she knew this.

I love my followers, but I hate my page. I feel like I’m not enjoying it anymore.

So apparently, one of my childhood dreams came true and my response was: Actually, never mind.

I don’t want to make content just because I want to make content anymore. The money is good, and the job is fun and easy, but this doesn’t feel like my real self anymore.

So I am deactivating it.

2. Read

I used to read one book a week when I was a teenager.

Now? Zero in a year.

Literally zero.

And I want to change that because I love reading, but after my Instagram addiction, my attention span became so low that I couldn’t read and finish a book anymore.

Apparently, watching 15-second videos all day was not great for my literary career.

Who knew?

3. Start playing piano

I used to play musical instruments—two of them, to be specific.

Then I moved to the USA, chasing the American dream, and forgot about the dreams I once had when I was a little girl.

That sentence is a little more depressing than I intended, but anyway.

I decided to start playing again.

Hopefully, my fingers remember more than my brain does.

4. Changing my city

I’m one of the few people I know who hates LA.

Yes, I know.

So when they asked me to move for work, I said yes.

Very quickly.

I’ve lived in many different cities, and I think each city brings out one side of you, so I’m really excited to see what my new city has for me.

Maybe a new personality.

Maybe character development.

Maybe I’ll hate it and move again.

We’ll find out.

There are more things I want to do, and I’ll add them weekly.

I have no idea if any of this will actually help me find myself again, but I’m giving it one year.

So if you want to read about my journey—or just watch me attempt to get rid of my own ick—subscribe.