Two young women have lifted the lid on their “platonic soulmate” bond – with the duo even sharing a bed.
Estella Kyriacou and Imogen Clarke, both 25, met online on an app for making friends in March and embarked on a whirlwind friendship that, seven weeks after meeting, saw them living together.
The twosome, who are both single, were feeling lonely and looking for friendship when they met, and the London-based pals now spend all of their time together and say people often assume they are dating.
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But instead, they consider themselves “life partners” while still being platonic friends.
“We spend all of our time together,” Estella told What’s The Jam.
“Platonic soulmates is a term we use because we feel like we just get each other.
“We know each other’s anxieties and triggers, we have so much fun together, and it really feels like we are life partners who share the day-to-day.
“We look forward to coming home to one another.
“Just like people feel that they are so lucky that they met their spouses and it was the right place and right time, we count our lucky stars because we are so beyond happy and blessed that we found each other.
“We always say we have such a good life together, and we really mean it.”
Estella, a law student originally from Toronto, Canada, and Imogen, a mortgage broker from Buckinghamshire, UK, even share a bed.
Estella explained: “I’m petrified of spiders and one night I woke up and there was one on the wall that jumped on my bed.
“I woke Imogen up at 5am and we both were too scared to kill it.
“So I ended up sleeping in her bed for what we thought would be like two weeks until it blew over, but we made a habit of it and every night we would just debrief the day in bed.
“A lot of people find it extremely weird and assume we are together.
“But it’s just like a sleepover with your bestie every night.”
Instead, the young women use the spare room as a walk-in wardrobe.
Estella added: “Imogen always jokes that she is going to kick me out, but it never happens.”
The duo, both currently single, said it doesn’t affect their love lives either, explaining: “We go on dates like anyone else, it doesn’t hold us back.
“Though we know that when one of us gets into a relationship, we will both have quite the adjustment period.”
They consider themselves soulmates, saying they “enhance one another’s lives”.
Estella explained: “We both really take care of each other and try to make each other’s lives as fun and easy as possible.
“I’ll wake up some mornings and Imogen will already have done three loads of laundry for both of us or one of us will surprise the other with a sweet treat when coming home.”
The women said the difference between a normal friendship and a ‘platonic soulmate’ bond is that their friendship sparked so quickly in a “when you know, you know situation”.
The duo first connected on the Bumble BFF app earlier this year and arranged to meet up at a local pub.
Estella said: “We were both a bit nervous, but as soon as we got there it felt comfortable.
“We had a few drinks and went to another pub, and we both said ‘OK, let’s be friends’.
“At the time we didn’t feel like we were best friends instantly, but we both clicked enough that we wanted to actually try to become friends.
“Similarly to dating, we both thought to put effort into the friendship.
“It was a few meetings and hundreds of voice notes after the fact that made us really feel comfortable with each other.
“We would text and send voice notes all day and just laugh our asses off because we both realised we had such a similar humour and personality.
“It was really giddy in the beginning, where you are smiling at your phone.
“Big cities can be very lonely at times and we both felt that.
“In your 20s, you really only meet people at work and school.
“We are both extremely similar but never would have been in the same environment to meet each other.”
The first time they met, the twosome had discussed their living situations, and both joked about moving in together.
But on their second meeting – a night out – they decided to go for it.
Their third hangout was them starting to flat hunt together in the capital.
Imogen added: “At this point, we weren’t best friends yet, but we knew we would get really close.
“By the time we signed the lease – just short of four weeks into our friendship – Estella said ‘We are going to be best friends’, and I said ‘I thought we already were’.”
The besties moved in together on 1 May, and say things have been “seamless” ever since.
Estella said: “We have gotten closer and closer each day.
“We are so comfortable and do everything together.
“Imogen does my laundry, and I cook us dinner.
“We share everything from clothes, make-up, food and shoes – you ask us, and we share it.
“We have a really similar way of living and really get each other, so it makes living together easy.
“We get a lot of questions asking if we are dating or more than friends, which makes us laugh – though we get why people are sceptical.
“We both feel like we are just living our 20s the way we want to and have someone to share it with.”
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