Wattpad Love Meets Real Love Drama

From best friends to (almost) lovers

Welcome to Campus love and everything in between. Over here, we dive into stories that explore what happens when real feelings collide with the beautiful chaos of University life. From crushes to unexpected friendships, we are here for all of it: the mess, magic and everything in between

Meet Iris, who thought that she'd get a Wattpad "enemies to lovers" romance but ended up with a real life "best friends to (almost) lovers” story. Today, she opens up about her story about love, growth, relationship and everything she learnt from her Campus Love experience.

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So on a scale of 1-10, how are you doing today?

7, I think. I just had one class today and I'm back in my hostel, free for the rest of the day, so I'm good!

Love it! So, first question. What was the first love experience you had as a teenager?

The first person I ever liked was my best friend. He joined our school around SS1 or SS2. At first, we didn't really talk much. But eventually, we formed a beautiful bond. He became one of the people I got the closest to in such a short time. We were just best friends initially. It didn't feel like a ‘love experience’ until after secondary school.

Interesting! So fast forward to University, was there any love experience?

Hmm, some might argue that I have a very boring love life in university. That same best friend I mentioned? We both entered the same university together. Honestly, the boys in my school, especially my set, don't really have sense, so there was no potential for a crush.

Okayyy. But what was the dynamic with your best friend like when you both got into uni?

Well, before uni, back in SS3, I already knew that he liked me. But I wasn't looking for anything serious at the time. It was after secondary school that I had this Eureka moment and realised that I liked him back.

Hmmmm. So what happened after secondary school?

The idea wasn't to jump into a relationship at the beginning. We both knew that we weren't in the right space or shape for a relationship, so we agreed to stay committed to each other without officially dating. It stayed that way from 100 level to 200 level… but things got very shaky from 200 level.

Would you call what you both had a situationship or an undefined relationship?

(Laughs) I'd say undefined relationship because it was much later that I realized a lot of things weren't actually properly defined. If I could go back, there are certain things I'd refine. Situationships sounds like we didn't know what we were doing, but to an extent we did.

You mentioned that things got shaky in 200 level. What happened?

I can't pinpoint when exactly, but in 200 level 2nd semester, things started getting shaky. We were constantly having issues that we needed to sort out.

It wasn't a very okay time in our lives. We were two young broken people trying to embark on something bigger than what we could handle. We didn't realise it then, but we just kept on hurting each other in the process. We both had a lot of healing to do individually before we could work out together as a unit.

What were some of the things you needed to work on personally?

For me, I was not one to deal with all these feelings and emotional stuff. I wasn't the kind of person that talked about how I felt or mentioned when something was wrong. I just bottled things up until one day I'd flare up.

I feel like it was definitely orchestrated by God to put us on a journey we both needed to go on and honestly it's been a very up and down journey.

Did your friends/family know about the relationship?

Oh, absolutely and it caused friction between us.

My mum knew him from secondary school as my best friend. But when it became clear that feelings were involved, my family wasn't okay with the fact that their “little girl” was dating. It didn't help that my brother also attended the same university and for some reason he or his friends always happened to see us together. Anytime they saw us, it turned into a huge problem, he'd go and tell my mother, and boom! Long discussions here and there.

How did you or your family handle all of this friction?

I'm not really an emotional person, but one thing I can do is to cry easily. Anytime I got angry or we were trying to settle something, I'd just start crying- in the cafeteria, outside, anywhere. Infact, my brother thought he was maltreating me. For some reason, it's when these tears starts coming out that my brother's friends will see me. They'd just pass, look at me, nod their head and walk away. Next thing? I'm getting long texts from my brother.

Oh wow! That's quite a lot.

My mum felt like I was deceiving her because I told her I wasn't in a relationship. To be fair, when she asked, I actually wasn't.

It got to a point that she involved one of my mentors, and we had to act like we weren't talking. Extended family members got involved too and started giving me long talks. It didn't help that I was very convinced he was my future husband. It has shaken a little bit but he's still someone I think I want to marry.

Interesting! Did anything happen during that period of friction too?

Oh yes, you know how parents invade your privacy? This boy writes and he'll write poems to me. I tried to be cute and sentimental so I kept everything in one place. One day, I came home from holiday and these people have gone through everything, all the poems, and everything he wrote to me, they even went through our chats! My mom got triggered with the fact that a guy his age was already thinking about marriage and how he wants to marry me and all of that. To cut the long story short, they weren't happy with it. It's something that if we get into a relationship that's one key bone of contention we'd need to work out.

I'm sorry but this is giving teen fiction movies!

I blame the years of my Wattpad phase😭

Wait! You read Wattpad too? Quick question: Do you think that wattpad influence your relationship in any way?

Girlllll Wattpad was my lifeeee😭

That's how my bad sleeping habits started because I was always reading late into the night. It definitely influenced me. It gave me unnecessary standards for relationships. I started to model myself based off of every character I read. Even till now, I say it's because of wattpad and Nickelodeon that I'm a very sarcastic person because that was how the girls were in almost every book I read and I didn't know when I emulated that.

I see, so you wanted a wattpad love story, right?

I really wanted a relationship that was like a story. Infact, I'd have even preferred “enemies to lovers” because that was my favourite trope but I got best friends to lovers and that's my least favourite trope in all of history!

It's giving what I ordered vs what I got 😅

What unrealistic expectation did you carry from wattpad story to your ‘relationship’?

I had very stupid standards about conflicts and communication.

One major advice: Don't read books like that if you don't have enough emotional intelligence and if you're not properly grounded in God. I've had to go on so many breaks and fast off books because I needed to realign my standards back to the word of God.

Wow, thank you for sharing. Going back a bit, how did that whole experience shape your view on relationships especially since it didn't work out?

Make sure that you know what you're doing before you enter into a relationship. Please define whatever it is you are going into. If you don't, it'll just give a huge space for so many unnecessary things to happen, like what happened to ours. We overestimated our abilities and maturity and it showed.

I understand that age is not synonymous to maturity but there are somethings you learn with age. I remember talking with someone one day and I was like, ‘Do you think if I had known better or we had waited better or had been smarter, I'd have had to go through all of this?’ She told me to look at it in a different way like everything I've gone through has made me the type of person I am today.

This is so beautiful. Was there any other thing you picked up?

Now, I understand that a relationship is not just all these cute fun games you read in wattpad or books. There's actually a whole lot of commitment and intentionality that goes into it and I'm still learning how to do all of that. I'd say that before you enter into a relationship, make sure you know yourself. I somehow lost myself in him and in the entirety of the relationship. I had to go on a journey of finding who I am, I'm still on that journey. But be very solid in yourself, in God and in your relationship with God. If you realise that there are areas you need to work, then probably don't enter into a relationship , build yourself in God to a point where you're much better.

How did you break free from the unnecessary standards you got from wattpad?

The first step was actually discovering and understanding that I had unrealistic love standards. I started to question how I reacted to some things and I'm like “Where did I get these ideas from?” I understood that a book is a book and it's not real life, I cannot try to model my life like that. As I continued growing in God, there was a time where I knew that I needed to take a fast off of books and wattpad. Wattpad became annoying at some point because I didn't find good books to read there so I stopped completely. I also started listening to godly examples.

I love your internationality. What were some of the godly examples you listened to?

There was a time where I was consistently listening to Pastor Mildred, and when I got introduced to CCI, seeing Pastey and PL's relationship, those mental models just started breaking down little by little so it got to a point where, to an extent, I'm able to know when something is unrealistic.

Was there any lesson that stuck with you from that season of your life?

Honestly, one thing was that I got to learn more about myself. I got to understand the need to be dependent on my identity with God and also how to navigate relationships better. You know how people say sometimes in relationships you get to find parts of anything yourself, so I got to find parts of myself that I needed to work on.

I also got to understand how to trust God especially in times when it felt like I was losing the one person that has constantly been by my side and that was him. It was like I was learning how to let go of a person and focus on God. This helped me in learning how to hold on to God more and understand the importance of healing and wholeness.

Any other things you want to share?

I think one thing I'll just say is, I don't regret the things that happened to bring me to this point. I'm not sure if I'd do everything exactly the same way again if I got the chance, but I know that I might be who I am or where I am today without going through that season of my life.

I enjoyed this, don't forget to call me for wedding rice oh 🙏🏽

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This story reminds us that relationship takes more than feelings and butterflies to sustain. If this story made you smile or reflect, don't keep it to yourself. Share this with someone and let's keep the stories (and maybe butterflies) flying.

Got your own almost love story or a love story waiting to be told? Send us a dm or leave a comment and the next feature could be yours.

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1. Some details have been edited for privacy sake