90 DAYS TO HUSBAND No. 2! Update From The ODG – Happily Ever After!

By Samantha Bessudo-Drucker | September 12, 2018 | Relationships

I’m back! Now known as Samantha Bessudo-Drucker (formerly von Sperling), I’ve been busy getting married, rebranding and starting a whole new chapter. One thing remains the same, I’m always ready to discuss matters of style, etiquette, dating, sex, healthy lifestyle, living your best possible self – and now design with tips to turn a little New York apartment into a stylish personal paradise!

A while back I stared in my own real-life New York City romantic comedy, a modern version of Crossing Delancey meets You’ve Got Mail. What resulted was a whirlwind romance culminating in a fairytale ending with a wedding in Paris!

My “90 Days to Husband No. 2” started out as an absurdly titled series of articles following my experience on a dating app. This particular app was the new release by Joseph Shapira, creator of JDate, aimed at Jewish millennials so they can date and hopefully mate; something akin to Tinder but with a Kosher twist.

It started out as a guide to successful dating via app with me often complaining about how men seem to have no idea how to date anymore and how my heart breaks for millennials. Even though they are masters of electronic communications, they lack the verbal skills and flirty knowhow to grow a romance and cultivate it into a relationship with substance.

As you may know from my previous articles, I’m a very open-minded person. Articles like, “Booty Calls: One Night Stands and Friends with Benefits” is an example. Post-divorce I had sworn off romantic, monogamous, forever love and simply explored the gamut of different kinds of intimate relationships available to us modern single gals in the city. In the 1960s people explored “free love.” Now there are apps to help you find what is known as the “hook up” — little colder, faster and efficient thanks to the digital world. In decades past you’d ask somebody for a light and that would start a conversation. Now that nobody smokes anymore, and asking if one has a USB to recharge your vape stick it’s just not quite the same, it’s harder for us to start a conversation with strangers.

Even though “90 Days to Husband #2” was meant to be outlandishly titled, it worked. Logically, my beaten-up heart and an app did not have me believing that I could find true love. However, I let my imagination wander. Being open to the possibilities of “What if?” can be a very powerful thing. With intention laid out, the plan and effort exerted equal a result. Love is never logical, so despite the illogic of my quest, I decided to go for it! There was no point in wasting my time and writing a series of articles to do it half-baked. As an image consultant who spent years telling my clients they could go after anything they wanted and succeed if they were willing to do what was required, I was ready; I owed it to myself personally and professionally. I had nothing to lose and I was ready!

I thought about animals in the wild and the mating selection process. When an animal decides its time to mate, they’re aggressive about it. They make it known. They send out special scents, fluff fur, fan feathers, maybe throw in a mating call for good measure, letting everybody know they are in heat. There are dramatic displays, dances and noises. Some bird species are required to show their nest building skills in order to be considered by the female as a viable candidate for making babies with. I kind of like that idea. If successful, some species mate for life, sometimes just to produce offspring, If the mating ritual is unsuccessful, the animals go their separate ways until the next candidate. There is a process with great intent and energy behind it.

I became my own best client and put together my proven client tested plan. The plan included creating a profile, uploading a recent headshot, a full-body length shot and a bio. Then I looked at my calendar and made a call to action for 90 days. The focus was working out, eating right, dressing carefully and doing hair and makeup. I was constantly thumbs-a-blaze in the message box of my app, rigorously receiving and sending messages to set up dates.

Time and focus with massive effort equals success. Since 90 days is not a lot of time, lunch meetings coffee dates, drinks and dinner were part of my rigorous regimen. I forced myself to go out on a date every night. Sometimes I went on lunch dates followed by both cocktail and dinner dates in the evening, upping the ability to screen more applicants in a day.

“90 Days to Husband #2” chronicles my dates, thoughts and mental state during this seemingly impossible mission.

Dating is difficult. It got to a point where I couldn’t take it anymore. It’s a classic moment of being knocked down before the big win. I couldn’t have scripted the storyline better if I tried. I was at my wit’s end. A few months prior I had made plans to leave the country and start a business overseas. Most of my apartment was already packed up or sold off. I needed my remaining strength and funds to close up and clear out gracefully and on time to catch my plane. My days left in Manhattan were numbered. Our heroine had written off love and was escaping to start a new life in Cartagena.

On September 28, 2015, my life changed radically.

“Just one final swipe,” I told myself.

Voila! There he was: an intelligent face with sparkling kind eyes, a few silver hairs that reassured me that he might have learned a thing or two on life’s journey, a warm smile and an energy that seemed to leap through the screen! I felt a surge of electricity, yearning, wonder and admiration when I saw his picture and read his profile. I clicked the “Like” button.

Six dates later put me on a plane from Colombia with a date for the holidays back in New York City. The holidays turned into three months and an invitation to “build a life together.” Inside his Queens apartment, I replied, “Walk with me,” and proceeded to ask him if we could knock out some walls and redo everything. A metaphor? We rebuilt our home and built our hearts for a love of a lifetime.

We got engaged on a boat on the Hudson, pink and gold shimmering sunset on one side, glowing moonlight on the other. In front of the Statue of Liberty, surrounded by the skyline of hopes and dreams, I knew we had started our never-ending journey of The Love and Design Project, now playing on YouTube.

In June 2018 we married on a yacht at sunset in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Miraculously, two first-generation Franco-American Jews, with the majority of both their families in Paris and a shared love of New York and design, found each other! We quickly realized each one of us possesses everything the other person is not and needs. We’re each other’s left and right leg and together we can walk — with a bit of swagger.

In the big bad city, at the last second, on an app not meant for us, we found love.

Read Find A Husband In 90 Days and Find A Husband In 90 Days – Round 2!

Learn how I found my wedding dress!

See all the looks from my wedding celebrations!