Reality star Jay Howard opens up about dating after Married At First Sight UK

Three years after tying the knot with Married At First Sight, Jay Howard has revealed details of her relationship life. The 32-year-old shot to fame on E4’s reality TV show in 2023, as relationship experts set her up with Luke Worley, 32.

The pair made a strong start, but Luke’s physical exchange with Jordan Gayle caused her to leave the experiment. She has since stressed the value of being authentic in the pursuit of love, despite the fact that Jay is no longer with Luke.

As MAFS’ first disabled cast member, this hasn’t been easy, but she stressed that anyone bothered by her limb difference, is ‘not worth it anyway’. In an exclusive interview with the Mirror, she said: “I mean don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to sit here and say it’s all sunshine and rainbows because it isn’t.

“You know, it’s hard work. Especially with everything being online, I hate online dating, I can’t stand it. Because you can simply swipe left or right based on the appearance, I believe it to be very laborious and very accessible.

People who have a disability are at a disadvantage when it comes to online dating because they are automatically recognized for having a disability and say, “No, can’t be bothered with that.”

“They’ll swipe on, which is hard. But it just depends, not everybody is so close-minded, there are people out there who are open-minded. ” Sadly, Jay isn’t alone in her thoughts, as many other individuals with limb difference also face discrimination on dating apps.

In 2023, Alannah Marchewka, from Leeds, told the Mirror how several dates were unable to look past her stoma bag, fitted in an emergency operation following a Crohn’s diagnosis. When people frequently ask, “Can you have sex?,” one of the first questions, “is really frustrating,” they say. ‘”, the 26-year-old said.

If I couldn’t have sex, does that make me less deserving of intimacy, care, and love, in my opinion, “it just circles back to that feeling of worth”? … We’ve been chatting for a while, and it’s happened three or four times to someone, and I’d let them know that I had a stoma and fistulas because they just didn’t like me.

“Or, I would get responses like, ‘ooh, that’s gross’ and people have asked me before ‘Do you sh*t in a bag? In the same year, research from the disability charity Sense UK also revealed that people with disabilities are more likely to feel isolated than the general population.

In light of these encounters, Jay wants to draw attention to the frequently overlooked needs and viewpoints of those with limb differences and disabilities. She hosted the first-of-its-kind chat show Unfiltered Women on ITV alongside Fats Timbo and Samantha Renke in November, where they openly debate everything and everything.

“It’s something that’s never been done before, people loved it, they want more of it,” the Lancashire-born star said. “It was light-hearted and it went the way that I wanted it to go, it wasn’t all doom and gloom, it wasn’t all like ‘feel sorry for the disabled [people]’.

More specifically, “We live in a positive way, but this is how we live.” And the information we are discussing is the information that people want to know but won’t because they fear they’ll open a can of worms. “

Source: Mirror