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Love Is Blind season 8 introduced viewers to several couples who formed connections in the pods and navigated their relationships outside the experiment. One of the key storylines revolved around David "Dave" Bettenberg and Lauren O’Brien, who got engaged after meeting sight unseen. However, their relationship took a turn when Dave learned that Lauren had been involved with someone shortly before joining the show.
In Love Is Blind episode 11, Dave ended their engagement, citing concerns about Lauren’s past and whether she was ready for marriage. He explained that people close to him, including his sister and friends, had connections to Lauren’s former partner and questioned her intentions. Speaking to People magazine on February 28, 2025, Dave stated:
"I'm just like, there's just no way I'm going to marry this person if that's what she was doing coming into it. I just can't justify that."
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Their breakup became one of the highlights of Love Is Blind season 8, with both Dave and Lauren offering different perspectives on the situation.
Love Is Blind star Dave gives his reason for ending the engagement
During the same interview, Dave explained that his decision was influenced by the timeline of Lauren’s previous relationship. He revealed that multiple sources told him she had been dating another man just weeks before entering the Love Is Blind experiment.
These sources included his sister, who was friends with the man’s best friend, and several close college friends who had direct knowledge of the situation.
"This is coming from not only my sister, who knows this guy's best friend but also my really close college friends that know him [and] were all telling me that they had been dating for three months, she was staying at his place the week before she left," Dave said.
He admitted that if Love Is Blind had been about finding someone to casually date, he might have been open to continuing his relationship with Lauren. However, given the serious nature of the show and the expectation of marriage, he felt he could not move forward.
Dave told People magazine in another interview released on March 1, 2025:
"I thought I'd finally put myself out there and I don't usually do that. And then just to have it blow up in my face was really hard to deal with."
Dave shared that he didn’t want to put his loved ones through the experience of watching him reject Lauren at the altar. He explained that once he knew his answer would be no, he decided not to make his closest friends and family witness it. Despite ending the engagement, Dave mentioned that he was open to finding love:
"I'm absolutely ready for marriage," he stated before adding, "I feel like what I've learned most about myself is just I can be vulnerable and I can put myself out there to meet the love of my life and who I'm going to spend the rest of my life with."
Love Is Blind star Lauren shares her perspective on the breakup
Lauren, on the other hand, felt that Dave Bettenberg used her past as an excuse to call off the engagement. Speaking to People on February 28, 2024, she stated that while she understood Dave’s concerns, she did not think it was fair that he refused to hear her out.
"I think it was fair of him to question me. I don't think it was fair to not let me be part of the conversation or to not hear me out," she said.
Lauren maintained that her relationship with the other man was casual and that he had been aware of her casting process for Love Is Blind.
"I say it very clearly and I still stand by everything I said. This guy knew that I was having casting conversations the entire time that we were hooking up. And this was a friends-with-benefits situation," she explained.
Lauren further shared that she struggled to understand why her past had led to the end of her engagement. She questioned herself, wondering whether she had misread the situation or if Dave had overreacted. However, she ultimately concluded that she knew her truth and did not believe her past should have been a dealbreaker.
Episodes 1-12 of Love Is Blind season 8 are now streaming on Netflix.
