Every Love Is Blind season features a certain amount of stress, particularly as the couples get closer to the altar. For Dave Bettenburg and Lauren O’Brien, their idyllic romance quickly took a turn as soon as they returned home from their vacation in Mexico. Ahead of the Love Is Blind season 8 finale, join us as we explore Dave and Lauren’s relationship, and whether the troubled pair end up becoming husband and wife.
Lauren’s pre-show love life caused chaos.
After flying home from Honduras and getting their phones back, Dave was inundated with messages from his friend group. According to Dave, he learned Lauren had been hooking up with one of his acquaintances prior to entering the pods, which he claimed threw their connection into question. “How do you go from seeing someone so recently to like, ‘I’m ready for marriage?’” he asked in episode 7. “That just seems like a huge step in between…That’s tough.”
Lauren repeatedly tried to reassure Dave, telling him that she was simply in a “friends with benefits” situation prior to joining the show. Recounting their conversation in a confessional, Lauren explained in episode 7, “I was like, talking to someone a couple of months ago, but I wouldn’t have said that I dated them.” Having realized she didn’t have a future with the guy, she felt more than ready to enter the pods and find her husband.
Dave and Lauren on a boat in Honduras.
Unfortunately, Dave refused to believe Lauren’s explanation, particularly when her former “friend with benefits” started telling everyone they’d hooked up the weekend before filming started.
Lauren’s ex defended himself from “camera hungry” claims.
Lauren’s ex is Daniel Nides, a 37-year-old lawyer who Photoshopped himself into a Love Is Blind poster—the incriminating evidence has been documented on Reddit, Betches reported. Despite any protestations to the contrary, it seems pretty clear that Lauren’s ex was angling for a role on the show, considering the fact he messaged one of her friends asking, “So, should we blow this wedding up or what?”
In an interview with The Tab, Daniel defended himself from allegations that he was hoping to make an appearance on Love Is Blind. Discussing why he made his own cast member poster, Daniel told the outlet, “I was just making light of a situation I didn’t have any control over, thought I’d give the people who know me a good laugh.” He continued, “Reddit found me out weeks ago and I just wanted to make sure I controlled my own narrative, and make light of it.”
Lauren tried “to understand Dave’s perspective.”
Many viewers probably found Dave’s inability to accept that his fiancée had past sexual partners to be a little misogynistic. However, Lauren had a very different interpretation of events, telling Us Weekly, “I genuinely was so torn on who was in the right. I knew my truth and I was trying to understand Dave’s perspective too.” She continued, “You see that a lot ’cause I give him a lot of grace. But I was so in my head [that] I’m like, ‘Am I the one that’s morally wrong looking at this and I just am not seeing it?’”
Lauren felt a change in her relationship with Dave the moment they returned from Mexico. “I could feel a shift from him pretty immediately when we got our phones back, but at that point, I did not realize how big of a story this other guy was,” she told Vulture. “I just didn’t understand it.”
The public support Lauren has received since the show aired has helped her to realize she “did nothing wrong.” As she told Us Weekly, “This is not a reflection of my inability to navigate a serious relationship. If anything, I think it gives me more credit that I can navigate relationships.” As for the Photoshopped Love Is Blind poster made by her ex, Lauren told the outlet, “Actually don’t go look at it because you should not be giving him more attention than he is getting right now. It’s exactly what he wanted, but I feel like I rest my case there.”
Dave ended the engagement, then had second thoughts.
During episodes 9 and 10, Dave wrestled with the fact Lauren had been casually seeing someone weeks before entering the pods. It transpired that Dave hadn’t been sleeping in the apartment he shared with Lauren, and he hadn’t introduced her to his friends or family, either. At the start of episode 11, Dave told Lauren, “Everybody in my circle, all of my close friends and family, a.k.a. my sister, heard about this guy.” He revealed that a number of his friends had been in a frat with Lauren’s ex, which only added to his confusion about the situation.
Dave suggested Lauren had told him she never actually ended her “relationship,” which she denied, telling him, “I said, ‘There was not a lack of closure in my opinion.’” Dave responded, “That’s not what I heard,” saying the entire situation had given him a “lack of trust.” Lauren affirmed that she’d been honest with him about everything, saying, “Like, we could’ve solved this. We could have been past this.” Understandably frustrated, Lauren told Dave, “You’re not ready to choose someone else and be a team member with them…If you were, then this would have been minuscule shit.”
Lauren and Dave on Love Is Blind season 8.
As for the fact that Dave seemingly refused to introduce Lauren to his family and friends, she suggested that he simply wasn’t prepared to stick up for her. “If you would’ve come to them and said, ‘Lauren’s getting a lot of shit right now and people are saying stuff. And, like, it’s important for our relationship that we find a way, even if it’s a fucking phone call, for you to interact with her.” Lauren also revealed that she “questioned” whether Dave even loved her. “I’m like, ‘If he loved me, and if he said all the things he’s saying to me to his sister, she would be, like, so excited for you and wanting to meet me,’” she explained.
At the end of the conversation, Dave said he felt as though he had to end the relationship, telling Lauren, “My heart thinks it’s the right decision.’” In a confessional, Dave said, “I’m sad, I’m mad, I’m frustrated. We have such a great connection. I feel like I let her down in a way, because I couldn’t get over, like, my own ego, my own pride, that she could’ve seen some other guy before me, which is very normal.” In her own confessional, Lauren said she’d “never been this heartbroken.”
At a group event the following day, shown in episode 11, Dave approached Lauren and told her that the connection between them was “real.” “I know you know it’s real too,” he explained. “And that freaks me out.” Lauren responded, “I want to believe it so badly, and a lot of me does, but it’s just, like, hard to fully…I think we’re past that.” The pair didn’t join the other couples at the wedding dress and suit appointments, and it’s unclear whether they rekindled their relationship.
Dave had his own red flags.
While Dave became fixated on the fact that Lauren had a “friends with benefits” situation prior to entering the experiment, his own red flags were on full display from the second he entered the pods.
In episode 8, during a group meet-up in Honduras, Dave proceeded to ask a number of contestants—including Virginia Miller, Monica Danús, and Taylor Haag—whether they’d had sex with their partners. Dave was shown admitting that he was yet to sleep with Lauren, but his candor wasn’t enough to stop viewers wondering why he was asking the women on the show such personal questions.
Aside from being forthright in his conversations with the other contestants, Dave revealed just how important his sister’s opinion was on multiple occasions. During an interview on The Viall Files podcast, Dave defended his sibling, saying, “The internet is just insane, because apparently having a good relationship with your sister is a bad thing. Sorry, she’s cool. Whatever.” In episode 11, Dave told Lauren that one of the reasons he hadn’t introduced her to his friends and family was “because my sister, she’s not happy. You know, she’s worried about me.” Ultimately, Dave’s close connection with his sister wasn’t the problem; it was his inability to make his own decisions, without deferring to other people in his life.
Dave has since suggested that he was happy he chose Lauren, posting a carousel of Love Is Blind photos on Instagram, with the caption, “No one I would’ve rather shared these moments with.” As for whether or not Dave and Lauren can work through their issues, we’ll all just have to wait patiently for the season 8 finale, which drops on Netflix on March 7.