When Emma Friend met her husband, David, she says they hit it off pretty quickly, but they didn't date until after he came home from his mission.
"One day he asked me to be his girlfriend and I didn't even know we were dating, so that was a shock but I was really happy about it,” Emma Friend said.
She said that a few months later, they got engaged.
"Pretty quick turnaround but we had known each other for about 5 years at that point,” Emma Friend said.
Though it turned into a fairytale for Emma and David, Friend said she has had a few classic breakups while being here at BYU before she met her now husband.
“They all ended in us being like 'oh I prayed about it and we're just not compatible' or 'I just felt like this isn't going to work,’" Emma Friend said.
She said that looking back, she can see why each of those break ups needed to happen and how she may not have been as compatible with them.
"But I don't think you know that either until you've dated a lot of people, and you actually know what you want to have in a partner," Emma Friend said.
Professor Chelom Leavitt, from the BYU School of Family Life, studies relationships and said it's important to know who you are, especially after a breakup.
"We live in such a swipe left, swipe right culture that too often we feel like we're being dismissed, and we really need to reassure ourselves and know who we are," Professor Leavitt said.
She shared that estimates from therapists show that only 60% of a person's needs are met through their partner.
"Even in a great relationship we need to have girlfriends or boyfriends. We need to have hobbies that we do on our own outside of the relationship," Professor Leavitt said.
Emma and David also have their own hobbies. David enjoys wood working and Emma enjoys reading.
"It may be a little less about who you marry, and a little more about why you marry," Professor Leavitt said.
She also said that breakups are a time for personal growth, so maybe they're a good thing.