“Every guy I was interested in was one of those 'friend' relationships where we were friends, but we were also going out on dates—but I wasn’t really sure if they were dates,” says Natalie, who joined CatholicMatch in 2010 when she was 26, and later met her future husband in 2012.
“In the end, the guy would be like, ‘Oh, you didn’t think I was interested in you, did you?’ Literally, every guy I was interested in—in college and post-college—did this to me.”
Natalie was tired of being treated this way. She wanted a guy who was willing to be direct and say, “I like you, and I am interested in you.” She began to pray to meet a man who was courageous and upfront about his feelings—a man that would take charge.
There's women right in front of you!
One reason Natalie joined CatholicMatch is that it's more difficult to get asked out in person these days. Natalie ponders why many men don't ask women out in person. "My baby sister who is in medical school told me, ‘I am with these guys all day in medical school, and they are constantly on their phones browsing online dating sites instead of looking at the women who are right in front of them.’ There has been a whole culture shift. I think it’s that veil of
anonymity that makes it more comfortable for everyone to correspond instead of asking out in person.”
This was certainly true for Stephen, 38, a firefighter from MA, Even though he was very confident, he felt more comfortable with online dating than approaching a woman he was acquainted with. He says that online was a better avenue for him because it was an easier way to approach women since it’s less threatening and rejection feels less painful compared to approaching a woman in person.
Stephen had been on pretty much every online dating site he could Google. He had dated a lot, but none of the relationships worked out. That is until he noticed Natalie on CatholicMatch and sent her a message.
When Natalie saw Stephen's message, she thought that he was out of her geography and age range. "I had set my parameters to only search men who were no older than 35-years-old. He also lived almost two hours away. I wasn’t interested in moving; I had lived in NH for 10 years and my family lived there.” However, she noticed that it mentioned in his profile that he was willing to move.
“I thought what’s the harm in talking with him?” she recalls.
Mr. Courageous
Atypical of most internet interactions, Stephen asked for her phone number almost right away. “We were trying unsuccessfully to set up a time to internet chat. He told me, ‘It seems like this isn’t working; could I be so bold as to ask for your phone number?’ I was a little hesitant. Usually, people don’t ask this until we’ve had more of a correspondence. I thought, 'I was praying for a man who was courageous, and that certainly seems like a courageous move,'" she recalls.
She gave him her phone number, and they had two one-hour phone conversations; after the second conversation, Stephen asked Natalie out.
Natalie remembers, “I told him that I wanted to have a long date because if he was going to drive four hours round trip to see me, then I needed the date to be longer than four hours.”
They met for Mass, and then went out for lunch and for a hike. Stephen wasn’t shy. On the first date, he made it clear to Natalie that he was looking for marriage. “I used to say, ‘When I get married, then I changed it to ‘if I get married,’ now I am at the age where I say, ‘Oh, goodness I hope I get married.’ I have wanted a family and wife since I was 20, but it just hasn’t happened. I am one of seven kids and all of my brothers and sisters are married. I have nieces and nephews in their 20s.”
He told her at the end of the date, “Some guys might wait to say this, but I really, really like you. I am excited about this.”
“I thought, Hallelujah! Finally, a guy who’s upfront with his feelings!” Natalie exclaims.
10 years of age difference didn't matter
Natalie, who initially met Stephen when she was 28, thought she would need time to adjust to the 10 year age difference. “After one date, I found that there wasn’t anything that made the age difference obvious to me. I only noticed some pop-culture differences.”
Stephen’s smile and frankness won her over.
He told her, “I am attracted to you because you are both physically attractive and incredibly faithful." The past women he had dated were either one or the other.
A pre-proposal
Natalie and Stephen had met online in February of 2012 and by July, he was ready to propose, but she needed more time to consider. She didn’t want him to ask for her hand until she was 100% ready to answer. “He let me know that I was the woman he was looking for. He sort of proposed before he actually proposed saying, ‘I know that you’re the one I want to spend the rest of my life with…’ I said, ‘thank you—I’ll let you know when I am ready for you to ask me that question.’"
In October, she told him she was ready.
On Dec 15th, 2012, he took her to a lovely spot in Newport, RI called the
“We drove to Newport where there are historic mansions on one side and on the other, there are waves crashing against the cliffs. Stephen took me down the historic 40 Steps to the rocks. We were sitting there with our legs dangling over the edge, and he was leading us in prayer. Then as we went to stand up I said, ‘I want to take a walk down that way.’ He told me, ‘No, I want you to stay right here.’”
“I was like, ‘Oh! Oh, my gosh, this is it.’ He got on one knee, and he had this gorgeous ring in his hand. He said, “I know that we will have our trials, but I also know that we will be able to handle anything together. Will you marry me?’”
Stephen had more planned; he also gave her a gift of Champagne flutes engraved with the words “Natalie & Stephen engaged on December 15th, 2012," and Champagne waiting for them at a nearby restaurant. “He wasn’t finished then either. For Christmas, he gave me a photo album with pictures from the proposal. He had hired a photographer to secretly photograph the entire thing.”
Natalie’s spiritual director during her college years, Bishop Daniel Thomas—who’s currently Bishop of Toledo, Ohio—married them on September 21, 2013, in Manchester, NH.
I don't think I can move
Even though Natalie initially had no intention of moving from her home in NH, they ended up moving to MA. “I had told Stephen on our second date, ‘If this is going to go farther, you need to know that I don’t want to
move.’
He said he was willing to move, but he's a firefighter who had been on the job for 15 years. If he moved, then he would lose all of the retirement benefits that he had built up. Also, he has a huge family that lives in MA. From September until April, we lived on the border of NH near MA, and Stephen commuted an hour and a half. I needed that transition time.”
Less than a year after they married, Natalie was able to find a job and they moved to be near Stephen’s family. “It’s great to be a part of Stephen’s big extended family,” she says. “I had always wanted to be a part of one.”
But we want kids!
A year into their marriage, they discovered that Natalie had endometriosis. She had surgery in November 2014 to fix the problem. They were hopeful that they would be able to conceive, but several months later, they started to discuss adoption. “Our plan since dating had been that we would both conceive naturally and adopt.”
In the summer of 2015, they called Catholic Social Services about adopting. They were told that CSS wasn’t accepting new couples because there were too many couples and not enough babies to adopt.
They had been praying a long time to have a child, and their prayers were answered. “I went on a
retreat, and everyone was touched by my story. They said that they would pray for me, and a week later, I received a novena booklet from the leader of my group. It was Novena to St. Gerard Majella, the Patron Saint of Expectant Mothers.”
On the first day of the novena, they received a message on Facebook from a director of pregnancy resource center about a mother that was looking for a Catholic couple to adopt her baby. On the last day of the novena, they found out that they were the couple chosen to adopt the baby that was only eight weeks from being born. On December 12, Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, they met with the social worker. "It all became real, and we told our family."
When they met the birth grandmother, she revealed that she and her husband had been praying to Our Lady of Guadalupe for the right parents to be brought into the baby’s life.
On February 16th, 2016, Stephen and Natalie welcomed baby Lily into their home.
