‘There is a seldom-discussed risk when it comes to queer dating – inadvertently being the subject of someone’s little experiment.’

Suzi Ruffell on sapphic dating, soulmates, and how she met her wife.

Six black and white photos of Suzi Ruffell striking poses against an orange and purple background

Comedian Suzi Ruffell's honest and hilarious memoir, Am I Having Fun Now? gets to grips with all the big questions. Does peaking in secondary school ruin you for life? Was Miley Cyrus right, is it all about the climb? What, scientifically, is the best way to mend a broken heart? In this edited extract, we find Suzi recovering from a break up and ready to start dating again – cue Fred Perry shirts, disappointment, and a cross-examination of the idea of 'the one'.

I have fallen in lust more times than I’d care to admit, but real love, Hollywood love, that ‘one’ that my grandparents had, was a far tougher nut to crack. It was time to start dating.

Some people love this activity. They see it as a sport, a numbers game, but, as I soon discovered, I wasn’t one of them. I’d done so many auditions in my life that dates felt like more of the same. ‘Hello, I’m here to read for the part of your life partner, would you like this in my own accent or RP?’

But I did love the getting-ready part. I’d shower, wash my hair, exfoliate my whole body and dress in my 2017 first date uniform of Calvin Klein undies, jeans so tight they were a second skin and a crisp Fred Perry shirt. I’d leave the flat with levels of confidence usually found in mediocre privately educated straight men but would routinely return home with the disappointment of a misguided X Factor contestant who hadn’t made it through to Judges’ Houses.

Don’t make the mistake of imagining that the sapphic scene is any easier than the straight one. Over the years I’ve had dozens of single hetero gal pals say: ‘Ooh, I’d love to be a lesbian, it must be so much easier dating women.’ But let me stop you right there. First off, it’s a little offensive to ignore the social, economic and misogynist prejudice you experience as an outwardly queer woman, and secondly, lesbian dating is just as confusing and infuriating as dating in the straight world. There are still fuck boys (although they’re actually girls), sociopaths, self-obsessives, narcissists, liars, an exceptionally high proportion of women who are still in love with their exes and, occasionally, the line between friendship and relationship can get a little blurred.

‘Don’t get me wrong, we all have to start somewhere but there’s something strange about going on a date and not realizing until it’s too late that you’re merely an exercise in exploring the other person’s sexuality.’

This is even more complicated by a seldom-discussed risk when it comes to queer dating – inadvertently being the subject of someone’s little experiment.

Don’t get me wrong, we all have to start somewhere but there’s something strange about going on a date and everything it involves – the nerves, the excitement, that feeling of what if she’s the one – and not realizing until it’s too late that you’re merely an exercise in exploring the other person’s sexuality. And this happened to me a surprising number of times. One friend reckons it’s because I’m not too girly but also not too boyish. Think of me as the gateway drug before you get to the hard stuff of butches and lipstick femmes.

And for queer women, another potential barrier to finding love is not having many options when it comes to meeting one another in real life. My gay male friends, on the other hand, have a plethora of places to visit when they’re single and ready to mingle. According to LGBTQIA+ media outlet PinkNews, as of October 2023 there were just three permanent lesbian bars or clubs in the UK, compared to two hundred and twenty-six gay bars. I’m aware that women and non-binary folk are welcome at most of these, but not having our own spaces does make it harder to meet.

So how does someone sick of apps, tired of organizing dates that go nowhere and without anywhere obvious to meet fellow gay women find love? As the months went by, I carried on searching for the One, although, increasingly, I wasn’t sure I still believed in the concept. The idea of a soulmate, just one person in the world that you’re perfect with, started to feel like too much pressure. There are 7.8 billion of us. What are the odds that the one with whom you can reach dizzying heights of love and happiness happens to go to your gym?

‘The idea of a soulmate, just one person in the world that you’re perfect with, started to feel like too much pressure. There are 7.8 billion of us. What are the odds that the one with whom you can reach dizzying heights of love and happiness happens to go to your gym?’

I started thinking about how the idea of the One makes you hunt for perfection, and I wasn’t even sure what perfection was meant to look like. I certainly didn’t feel like I was anyone’s idea of perfect. Perhaps I needed someone who would open my eyes to new things, someone I’d find new hobbies and interests with, but equally, someone I could be apart from. Someone who wasn’t my other half but a full person with their own separate life that I’d adore.

And that’s exactly what I eventually ended up finding.

A wedding is officially one of the top five most romantic places to meet your future spouse. The others are Disneyland Paris, the Orient Express, a village pub on Christmas Eve and the start line at the London Marathon. I don’t make the rules, don’t @ me.

When the bride, Camille, first mentioned I might like her friend, I bristled a little: just because we’re both single and gay doesn’t mean we’ll fall for each other, right? But within twenty minutes of chatting to Alice, I could see exactly why Camille thought we’d get on. She was interesting, chatty, she made me laugh, she was beautiful and she had a gentle confidence that I found incredibly sexy.

Alice and I quickly became a couple and for the first time in my entire life I felt at ease. I didn’t feel like I had to prove anything to her. I just trusted that she liked spending time with me. After knowing Alice for only a couple of months, I knew she wasn’t the type to lie to me or be careless with my feelings. She wouldn’t bother wasting her time. She didn’t need me. So many previous relationships, in retrospect, felt transactional in one way or another. I didn’t need her either. We just wanted each other. More than anything else.