Screen Rant has been revealing details from our exclusive interview with Love is Blind’s Danielle Drouin all week. For those needing a quick refresher, Danielle had a unique experience on the show and fell in love with two men while in the pods. She ended her experience on the show engaged to Rory Newbrough, but they broke up shortly after leaving Love is Blind.
A major factor in their breakup was Danielle’s feeling for the other man, Matt Thomas. Danielle felt a draw to both men, but made the decision to see how things would work with Rory in the real world. Ultimately, their lives were too different to work and Danielle decided to explore her feelings for Matt.
Danielle told us about the complicated relationship that came with dating Matt. According to Danielle, Matt wasn’t into labels and didn’t want to commit to the boyfriend-girlfriend thing. She was understanding and still wanted to see if things could work out, but Matt also told her about a girl he met prior to the series and still had plans to travel with to Paris.
In the Danielle interview, she described the Matt and Paris incident like this:
“I was like ‘Hey, you never brought up the Paris thing again. Are you still going to Paris?’ He couldn’t even talk to me. He called me over to his house about two days after I asked about Paris. He then basically gave me an ultimatum. He told me that he wanted to continue a relationship with me, but he didn’t want to have restrictions and he doesn’t like labels, He still wanted to see other people.”
She further explained that this development helped her make the decision to end things with Matt:
“I told him that wasn’t the relationship I was looking for, and that if he went to Paris, I wasn’t going to be around anymore. Because as a woman, I know my worth. I don’t want to wait around until you decide that it’s time to commit. I care about you and want to have a relationship with you, but I’m not looking for that kind of relationship. I was looking for something long term and someone to start a life with. So he went to Paris. We didn’t talk after that for months.”
Screen Rant also interviewed Matt Thomas to get both sides of their unaired romance. Like every good story, there are two sides to it. In order to understand Matt’s side of things, we have to go back a few months before his Love is Blind experience.
“About three months before the show, I had met a girl at a chess tournament. I was training for chessboxing, and I was at the World Open in Philadelphia, and I met another chess player. Her and I connected; it wasn’t overly romantic or anything, we didn’t even kiss, but it was just a strong connection.”
After the show, Matt saw Rory and Danielle together and engaged, so he reached out to this woman again.
“I stayed in touch with her, and she knew I was going on the show. So, the next day after the bar, I called her. She lives in Serbia, so there’s a time difference and the physical distance, so we couldn’t really be anything even if we wanted to. So, I just told her everything that happened on the show. I fell in love with this girl, she picked another guy and they’re together. And the way that she responded was awesome. She said ‘Okay, so you’re telling me you’re not engaged.’ I said ‘No, I’m not engaged. She said, ‘Okay, let’s do a trip together.’”
Matt was doubtful of her being serious at first, but she took out a laptop and they booked a trip to Paris, two months in advance. Matt said that this was his way of “taking steps to moving on.” However, his plans to move on from Danielle wouldn’t last too long.
“Danielle gets back a few days later. I learned when she got back that she went to Miami with Rory to see if things would work. And when we met up when she got back, she wasn’t wearing her ring, and she told me that she made the wrong decision, and that she wanted to see if this would work and if we could give this a shot.”
Matt told Danielle that he wanted to give their relationship a try in the real world. He also explained to her about the other girl, which he said that Danielle was understanding and still wanted to explore things. He later told the other girl about how things changed between Danielle and him.
“So, I went back to the Serbian girl that I was going to Paris with, and I called her and told her what had happened. And she asked me, ‘Hey, if you don’t pursue this, are you going to come to Paris with regret? Are you always going to wonder what if?’ I said, “Yeah, I think there’s a part of me that would.’ She said, ‘I don’t want that. So do whatever you need to do, explore whatever you need to explore, and I hope you still come to Paris.’ I said okay.”
Matt said that Danielle and him then had “a beautiful two months together.” They met each other’s family, did yoga, hiked, cooked, and he had a lot of fun with Danielle on a couple of trips…
“But they (the trips) also told me kind of what I was suspecting as we went through this dating experience, which was that Danielle and I are so similar and have so much common ground and so many shared interests – almost like we’re the same person. And I think that both of us realized through this experience that maybe in a life partner, it isn’t best to have someone that’s exactly like you. It might be best to have someone that balances you out, that’s an equal opposite. Someone that’s from the other side of whatever spectrum you’re on, that can help give a different perspective and help you grow and challenge you in ways that you can’t challenge yourself.”
He further explained that:
“So, we talked about that the week before the Paris trip was supposed to happen, and we agreed on how to proceed with the intention of being friends. And that’s what happened. I went to Paris.”
There is a lot more of both Danielle and Matt’s story coming soon, so keep it glued to Screen Rant for more exclusive interviews.
Screen Rant edited this interview for clarity.
