I’m 19 years younger than my fiancee and trolls say I have ‘daddy issues’
A couple with an age gap of 19 years has revealed how obsessed stalkers frequently try to break them up by sending messages to the pair saying their relationship is built on ‘daddy issues’. They’ve often got messages from strangers pretending they’re cheating and have even received kidnapping threats. Michael Justin, 46, and nurse Emily Downing, 27, met at a yoga class in 2019 and love quickly blossomed.
However, because of the age gap, the pair was hesitant to start a relationship and not long after meeting Michael moved to Los Angeles to further his modelling career while Emily continued to study nursing in Arizona. When the pandemic hit in 2020, the two realised they couldn't stand being apart and Michael moved back to Arizona and they got a place together. It was at this point they went public with their relationship, something Michael had never done before.
There was an immediate backlash on Michael’s social media from a creepy subset of his fans and Emily found herself being harassed, abused, and even had strangers ringing her number, trying to convince her Michael was cheating on her. But despite Covid, obsessed stalkers, abusive messages claiming Emily looks older than Michael, and weird kidnapping rumours seeded by social media trolls, the couple got engaged this year.
Emily and Michael are getting married in November (mediadrumimages / @emdowning)
Emily says trolls tell her she looks older than Michael (mediadrumimages / @emdowning)And rather than shy away and leave social media, Michael and Emily launched a TikTok channel and have grown to an entirely different type of follower who is largely positive about their relationship and even ask for dating tips.
Speaking about the highs and lows, Emily revealed: “At [the start of] the relationship, we had been a little bit more private than we are now. Just because during the start of the pandemic, Michael had a pretty big following on Instagram prior to having a following on TikTok. I actually used to get really scary messages on DM (direct messages) and they got my phone number at one point and these mega fans of Michael would be saying these terrible things to me.
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“We could tell they were trying to make me believe that Michael had cheated on me and trying to break up our relationship. So I thought, ‘You know what, let's just end this for once and for all’. We should just embrace it and say, we're a couple and just really show people that we're together and then people will probably stop bullying me because I'm probably getting bullied just because we're being secretive about it.”
The 27-year-old gets told she has 'daddy issues' (mediadrumimages / @emdowning)
The happy couple got engaged and are getting married this year (mediadrumimages / @emdowning)Their first TikTok as a couple was a huge hit and got three million views – an incredible feat in 2020 when the app was just taking off globally. “Being with me has definitely slowed down his stalkers, he doesn't have as many as he used to,” said Emily.
“You have to make a switch with your followers,” added Michael.“When I first started posting anything on Instagram about Emily, I think I lost about 8,000 followers the first week.” Despite making great strides with their new followers, there is still the occasional bit of weirdness on social media. Only recently TikTok users claimed Michael had kidnapped Emily.
“I think it's like some kind of a trend, or, honestly, people just love to feed off something negative because it's just so drastic and stupid,” said Michael.“We were sitting in a coffee shop and it was raining and I had my hoodie over my head. It was enough for, obviously, the younger generation of TikTok, to literally think, ‘here's this old guy’, and it's the perfect storm.”
Michael and Emily think the rumour is so ridiculous that they’ve been having fun creating tongue-in-cheek videos mocking it. According to the couple, the trolls tell Emily to wear green if she’s been kidnapped so they like to indulge the crazy whenever they can.
Emily and Michael's relationship has gone from strength to strength (mediadrumimages / @emdowning)
The couple don't listen to the trolls (mediadrumimages / @emdowning)“I was gonna put her in green and literally talk about our wedding,” jokes Michael, with Emily adding, “Clearly I wouldn't be talking about my wedding and marrying this man if he kidnapped me.”
The couple says that despite their following being largely positive now, Emily still gets comments from people saying she has “daddy issues” or claiming she looks really old. “I've gotten a lot of comments that say, I look older than Michael,” she said. “You know, they were like, ‘Oh, this girl has terrible skin. She needs to put sunscreen on. She looks like she's 60’ but we don't let the negative comments get to us. Those people are clearly sad and mad people and that's their problem.”
Now the couple are looking forward to their wedding in November and want to start a family.“I've kind of always known I wanted to be a mom; I feel like I was born with that maternal energy,” said Emily.“That was one of the reservations in the beginning of our relationship.“I figured, oh, he's an older bachelor, he probably doesn't want kids.“When it came time to talk about engagement and wedding, he said to me, ‘You are the only girl I've ever pictured myself being able to have children with.’”
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