Brittany Hockley’s Relationship Timeline From Raya DMs To Proposal
Last week, the internet exploded with joy as Brittany Hockley announced her engagement to her long-distance European love, Ben Siegrist.
For anyone who has been following Britt’s journey from day one (aka when she got Honey Badgered back in 2018), you’ll know that this love story has been a long time coming.
Whether you’re a Lifer or just a peripheral fan of the media girlie, Britt’s love story with Ben is one for the modern romantics. So if you’re in the mood to get mushy and recap how it all went down, here’s the full timeline for you.
November 2022: The pair match on Raya
“I’m crushing hard!” Britt admitted on an episode of Life Uncut in late 2022. “No, I am going to tell you this is a disaster waiting to happen,” co-host and bestie Laura Byrne chimed in.
This was the first time we were introduced to Britt’s mystery guy on the podcast. “Personally, you know I have an attraction to people that aren’t here, because I’m a commitment-phobe,” Britt laughed. “I’m not in love with him, I’m in lust with him. It was three days!” The juxtaposition of Laura’s married life with Britt’s single adventures has always been a selling point of the show, not to mention a refreshing example of how female friendships can still thrive despite being in different life stages.
She later revealed that she had matched with a then-unnamed athlete on Raya. He was a Swiss goalkeeper based in Scotland, and the two connected when his team Celtic FC was playing in Australia. What she assumed would be a fun fling, soon turned into something more serious.
January 2023: Insta-official
“From Paris, with love. I think I may have found me a keeper #hardestlaunch,” Britt captioned a cute af reel with Ben on their European holiday together. “WE LOVE LOVE!!” her legion of fans commented (a catchphrase of the podcast), while showering her with praise about how happy she looked and how cute they were together. Having candidly shared her many dating stories, from the frivolous and funny to the heartbreakingly sad, it became clear along the way that fans of Britt were genuinely invested in her love life and her quest to find “her penguin”.
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Britt elaborated on the relationship on an episode of Life Uncut after the hard launch, explaining that she and Ben had decided to accept the challenges that came with a long-distance dating and give it a go.
“I felt like there was an angel and devil on my shoulder. One part of me was like ‘Amazing, this makes me feel good’, the other part of me was like ‘HOW AM I GONNA TELL LAURA?’” Britt joked with her overprotective but ultimately supportive co-host.
June 2023: Ben appears on the Life Uncut podcast
After numerous holidays together throughout the year, Ben came to visit Australia and the gals got him on the pod to introduce him properly to the listeners. Laura joked that the only time she’d seen Ben IRL prior to this was last year during a one-night stand, and grilled him on how things turned from casual into feels.
Britt joked about how she reckons flashing him as he left her apartment probably sealed the deal, but Ben insisted that it was the fact that Britt had said she’d love to date him if he lived in Australia.
“I was like, hmm, you know, what difference does it make where I live? You know, people do long distance and all that kind of stuff, which is funny because I was adamant I didn’t want to do long distance. But that was the moment where I was like hmm, might as well give this a try!” CUTE.
The two acknowledged the difficulties of long distance, but listeners got a sense that an ocean and a timezone between them weren’t going to stop them.
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December 2023: The couple share a white Christmas together in Scotland
In an extremely convenient coincidence, it turns out that Britt’s sister Sheridan had relocated to Scotland with her partner, so Britt managed to pull off a Christmas with not only her boyfriend, but her family (as her parents flew over too).
The loved-up couple shared cosy footage of their first Christmas together, surrounded by snow, family and friends, before switching it up with a quick trip to the Maldives in the new year. MUST BE NICE.
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February 2024: Britt goes public about freezing her embryos with Ben
On an episode of Life Uncut, Britt vulnerably shared that she and Ben had made the decision to freeze embryos together the previous year.
“It might seem like to a lot of people that that came really quickly in our relationship. But I think relationships develop at different times, the older you get, and sometimes when there’s an external pressure, like a biological clock, and like the extra fertility stress, you do make decisions,” she explained.
Britt had been open previously about her egg-freezing journey, publicly documenting it both on the show and on her socials, however, she had been hesitant to share the embryo freezing experience as her first experience tragically didn’t go as they’d hoped.
She told listeners that they waited a few months to emotionally prepare for their next round, and that Ben flew in for the week to be there for her collection.
“If I got none again, he thought that I would be a mess and I would have been. So he was really beautiful,” Britt shared. “We did the whole thing again. And long story short, we ended up with five, which is great. And then three good ones, so three that are viable.”
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Absolutely love to see people in the public talking candidly and honestly about fertility, it’s enormously helpful and brave.
June 2024: BRITT AND BEN GET ENGAGED
Alright alright, here’s what you’ve been waiting for.
“In any lifetime it’s a YES! Just two people loving each other for the rest of our lives,” Britt posted on Instagram last Wednesday, holding up a fat rock on her ring finger in a blissed-up selfie with Ben in Hamilton Island.
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AND THE CROWD GOES WILD.
Comments came flooding in from fans of the couple, congratulating them and Britt in particular for locking in her forever guy. In the carousel of pictures, we see the couple dressed in white on a private beach. There’s a helicopter. There’s a boat. We’ve got the kneel. We’re embracing.
While some were quick to speculate that the proposal might be staged, Britt clarified on this morning’s episode of Life Uncut that she’d seen a photoshoot taking place metres up the beach with some beautiful women as the helicopter landed on the beach. Little did she know, that was just a decoy photoshoot, and Ben had organised for a photographer to capture the moment.
Turns out, Ben had hurried her out the door for a surprise date where the only information she had was that she had to look nice and that they were going snorkelling. Ben grabbed a dress for her with cut outs all down the sides, and thinking that she’d be quick to change into togs, she threw on a pair of ugly undies.
“When I went back through the photos, because the dress has all this open side, and I just had the oldest, ugliest, grayest undies on that you could see. Because I was like, fucking who cares? I’ll get changed into my swimsuit when I get there. So then as soon as I realised we were engaged, I took my undies off,” she clarified, before joking about free-flapping in the pictures.
Well folks, there you have it. Love is real, and this is your reminder to throw out the relationship rules and go with your gut. You just might score yourself a foreign athlete and a happily undie-free ever after!
Written by Lil Friedmann, a staunch defender of reality television and investigator of celebrity hookups. You can follow her at @lilfriedmann on socials.
Image credit: @brittany_hockley Instagram