Jared “JP” Pierce is going public with his new girlfriend a year and a half after his split from Taylor Rue.
The Love Is Blind alum, 32, shared a post to Instagram on Thursday that included a series of photos that documented the course of his relationship with his girlfriend Ellen.
“Over a year ago I met the sweetest, most loving, caring, awesome, sexy, and fun person,” he gushed in the caption. “She’s just the best! 🫶.”
The carousel featured pictures of the couple attending sports games, music festivals, going on date nights and their vacation to Cancun, Mexico.
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JP’s relationship debut follows his awkward split from his former fiancée Taylor.
In season 5 of Love Is Blind, JP and Taylor hit off in the pods and were the first to get engaged. However, the two struggled to form a genuine connection after their awkward reveal and ultimately called it quits days into their Mexico trip.
During the getaway, conversation flow was a big issue for the pair, with Taylor, 26, expressing her desire for JP to speak more while JP was adamant that he didn’t want to feel pressured. This resulted in some very awkward moments between the engaged couple.
Later, when Taylor confronted her firefighter fiancé on camera about their major disconnect, he finally admitted that he’d felt uncomfortable with her physical appearance the first time they saw each other in person. “It felt like you were fake,” he said in episode 6. “You had a caked-up face, fake eyelashes … you presented fake stuff.”
“When I first saw you, you had all this stuff on, I was like, ‘Well, is this gonna be an everyday thing? Am I gonna have to deal with this, you putting on a face?’ You’re literally putting on a totally different face, and I was like, ‘Well, that’s not really what I want,’” he said, before emphasizing his desire for her make-up free appearance. “I want this face.”
Taylor did not take kindly to his words and decided to take some space from JP before ultimately ending their engagement the next morning.
During their appearance on Love Is Blind: The Reunion, the former couple addressed their communication issues in Mexico. JP chalked up his behaviors to nerves and claimed that Taylor “didn’t try” to further their relationship, which she denied.
“I felt like I did try. I was basically pulling things out of him in Mexico and it was still not enough,” she said. He then responded, “That’s not the way to get me to open up, to keep hounding me.”
As co-hosts Nick Lachey and Vanessa Lachey pushed the topic further, Taylor admitted, “I don’t think that he was attracted to me from the second we met each other. He gave me zero validation, when I asked about our future, he didn’t answer… and on top of that, you belittled me and made me feel less than I am.”
JP later admitted that Taylor was not the type of woman he would hit on in a bar as he said, “Definitely the first time I saw her was a little shocking and off-putting. I just think it’s kind of fake and not something that I generally like to [see].”
Ultimately, he apologized for his words, reasoning that “I genuinely wanted to let you know that I think you’re beautiful without makeup,” and Taylor said she forgave him.
Love Is Blind season 5 is streaming in full on Netflix.
