Love Is Blind alum Natalie Lee has revealed that she plans on donating her wedding dress from her season two ceremony with ex Shayne Jansen.
The reality TV contestant posted a photo of her strapless white wedding gown to her Instagram Story and asked her followers for advice. “Any suggestions on where I can donate my LIB wedding dress? It’s a US size two tailored from bust to floor at 162 cm. (I bought her with my own money so it took a while to let her go).”
One fan asked Lee whether or not production paid for the contestants' wedding dresses on the show, and Lee clarified: “They do but you have to choose a dress from their selection and I wasn’t really loving any of them so ended up buying my own! Mostly because I thought it would be my only wedding.”
Lee starred in season two of Netflix’s popular reality TV series, which is set in a different American city each season, with her season taking place in Chicago. On the show, Lee shared a rocky romance with Jansen, who proposed to her after connecting in the pods - where contestants meet other contestants without seeing what the other looks like.
When Jansen initially proposed to Lee, fans were skeptical of his intentions, as he had also established a flirtatious rapport with another contestant, Shaina Hurley. The red flags became even more glaring as the couple had a fight about the ways in which they express affection.
But once they returned to their “real lives” back in the Windy City, fans were certain that Lee and Jansen were an absolute dream team, that is, until their wedding day. The night before, the pair had a blowout argument that led to Lee feeling uncertain about their engagement and questioning their entire relationship.
At the time, she revealed that Jansen had told her that he “hated her” and that she was “the worst thing to ever” happen to him, leaving Lee feeling rattled. She shared in a confessional: “Before our fight, I was 100 per cent sure I was going to marry him today...”
Lee ended up choosing not to say ‘I do’ at the altar, but they reconciled a week after the series finished filming and reportedly dated for “several months” until calling it quits for good. “A week after our wedding, we started dating again,” Natalie shared with People in 2022. “Maybe it’s not dating - we continued our engagement again. We were together for several months.”
“I think at the end of it, we realised that we’re very different people with different needs and wants that we can’t fulfill for one another,” she added. “We did take a break in communication after that, just to get into a better place.”
But even after their split, there was still drama between the two, with Lee alleging that Jansen had “started the casting process” with Netflix’s Bachelor in Paradise-esque dating series, Perfect Match, which includes contestants across all of the streamer’s most successful reality TV shows.
“Shayne and I were both approached to apply for it while we were in a relationship (casting didn’t know we were together at the time),” Lee shared in an Instagram Story in January of this year. “We told each other we declined the opportunity, but I later found out he actually didn’t decline and started the casting process in Nov 2021 without my knowledge at the time, while we were still together.”
Although Lee noted that they split around November 2021, she claimed that Jansen would oftentimes text her from the set of Perfect Match. “He texted me numerous times he wanted to leave midway through filming because he still had feelings for me after we saw each other for [the] first time since our breakup at the reunion show taping,” she explained.
Jansen refuted her claims with alleged text messages sent to him around November 2021, with Lee encouraging him to go on the show, telling Jansen “I really want you to enjoy life because this show for you is once in a lifetime opportunity” and “it’ll help with your future goals”.
Love Is Blind season five is currently streaming on Netflix.
