The One That Got Away is unlike any dating series you’ve ever seen before. Six singles, including Jeff Perla, were given the chance to explore a lifetime of missed connections in hopes of finding love. The journey was a happy one for Jeff. He is now officially in a relationship with his “bestie with benefits” Alex Van Gurp. HollywoodLife got EXCLUSIVE scoop from Jeff about keeping his relationship with Alex until the show was released.
“To be honest, it was kind of hot because Alex and I had this secret that just both of us had for a whole year. We didn’t tell our family. We didn’t tell our friends. Nobody knew anything for a whole year,” Jeff told HollywoodLife. “There’s obviously always rumors that’s like, oh, they’re dating. We just never confirmed anything with anybody, so I literally called my friends and my family and his family maybe three days before it came out. We were like, ‘Hey, just so you know.’ It was really funny.”
Jeff said that their families were “really happy” for both of them. As for what their status is right now, Jeff revealed, “I’m not engaged. We’re definitely together. We have some fun things in the works that we’re working on, so projects will be revealed soon, but not yet.”
While keeping their relationship a secret, Jeff and Alex didn’t have to change things up too much since they already spent so much time together. “Well, I think with any relationship the secret aspect is fun in and of itself,” Jeff admitted. “I love just going out with our friends and then you’re drunk and sneak in the bathroom to give each other a kiss and laugh about how they have no idea what’s going on. We still did our usual things with everybody. We travel all the time together anyway, so there were really no red flags to anybody watching because there was nothing different necessarily.”
Jeff and Alex are very happy with where their relationship stands right now. However, Jeff admitted that he was initially “comparing” his relationship with the other couples on the show.
“Obviously, when you’re on a dating show, you’re comparing relationships, right?” Jeff revealed. “So in the beginning, when I saw all these relationships flourishing I felt like… as we all saw, I got rid of everybody at one point. I was alone. And I was just sitting there wondering why is this not working for me? That was due to the fact that I’m looking at all these other relationships where they feel so strongly about one another, and I’m like, why don’t I have that? You can’t compare your relationship to their relationships. But Alex and I are on a completely different trajectory. I feel like we both are very similar in what we want out of life. And if people feel like, right away, they want to get engaged, go for it. But I am not that person. I wanted to make sure things were going to work outside of the show. I want to make sure this is so authentic. We needed to have conversations after this, and we just sat down and dished on everything.”
Given that Jeff has found the love he’s been looking for with The One That Got Away, the travel blogger urged potential contestants in the future to take a chance on second chances. “I would say this for anybody: if somebody comes back into your life and wants a second chance, or whatever the case may be, maybe you just didn’t have that relationship connection at the time, just hear them out and give them that chance,” he told HollywoodLife. The One That Got Away is now available on Prime Video.