Hope Antoniello-Foley, 33, has spent her life happily watching meet-cutes play out on her screen, from fairy tales to “a good Hallmark movie.” “I keep hoping that’s going to happen to me, that I could just bump into somebody and spill my coffee and, ‘Here I am finding the love of my life,’ ” she tells Tudum over the phone. “That doesn't happen.” So Antoniello-Foley turned to “the apps” — the swipe-happy dating apps like Bumble, Hinge and Tinder (sans swindler) — to find romance. “But even then, they are so awful. It is unbelievable,” she continues. “I'm at a point in my life where work’s really great and I want to find that person to go do things with and to travel.”

Then Antoniello-Foley’s friend found a call for new Love Is Blind contestants floating around the internet. The two studied the application during a lake-house getaway, and Antoniello-Foley eventually filled it out. Months went by... nothing. At last, the phone rang. Soon enough, she would be sitting in the Love Is Blind pods preparing to date 15 men, sight unseen, and maybe just get engaged to one of them. “It doesn’t matter what I look like, how much I weigh, color, ethnicity, anything...it is who you are inside,” she says in the show’s premiere. Despite giving the experience her all, Antoniello-Foley, like fellow cast members Chassidy Mickale and Juhie Faheem, didn’t leave Love Is Blind Season 2 with a partner. They all, however, say they got so much more out of the “experiment” than a three-week-long fiancé.  

Mickale, a 34-year-old business owner, felt optimistic on set before even talking to a single guy, due to the camaraderie between the women on her side of the pods. “I’m not a toothpick. It’s good to see another woman like that,” she says, thinking back to the set. “We want to see people who look like us, no matter what. Not even looking at color, size, shape. It gives us a sense of comfort.”

Antoniello-Foley even noticed that fans felt that sense of comfort before Love Is Blind Season 2 even aired. She received supportive Instagram comments about her casting in the series; followers were happy to know someone who “looked like them” would soon be on their screen. “I want viewers to know that they don't have to be a size zero or tall, skinny and blond like the people society always thinks are getting chosen,” Antoniello-Foley urges.

To create this kind of representation, everyone had to settle into filming. The transition was easy for someone like Faheem, 31, a Muslim woman. “It was really nice to be like, ‘Hey, I'm not wearing super-revealing clothing or anything,’ and still being liked by everyone.” Mickale is also happy that looks didn’t play into the experience. “Joining the show meant I was able to meet all different types of people,” she says, “or even be approached by them. We may have both been intimidated outside due to our appearances.” Such common dating issues are eliminated on the set of Love Is Blind, a show where people spill their hearts to each other through an opaque wall.

Still, it was impossible to avoid all talk of looks. When conversations around physical appearance bubbled up, Mickale would refer to herself as “a woman of detail.” “If someone wanted to dig in deeper, I said, ‘Some people like chicken wings and some people like thighs.’ It’s a preference!” #WomanOfDetail is now in her Instagram bio. Five-foot-one Antoniello-Foley called herself “fun-sized” and was proud to share her Italian-American background. Faheem’s name inspired suitors to politely inquire about her Indian heritage since, as she points out, she doesn’t have an “Americanized Caucasian” name. “But luckily, nobody really asked me, ‘Hey, what's your size?’ Or ‘What's your eye color?,’ ” she says. The most invasive question she recalls was, "What are you wearing today?"

For women focused on values-based dating, the pods were a welcome respite from an oftentimes shallow — or simply DTF — dating world. Faith-forward Faheem came to Love Is Blind looking for “her person.” “I was never one for hook up culture. I struggle to go on dates with people who may want to just hook up and then maybe get serious,” she explains. During production, Faheem was able to talk “love, trauma, finances or kids even” with someone she didn’t know a mere two weeks prior. “In the pod, it's like, ‘We're both here. We’re not going anywhere. Let’s talk it out,” she says.

Similarly, Antoniello-Foley was looking for someone who appreciates family. “My mom is my best friend...If [a guy] doesn’t have a huge family, that’s fine. But they have to approve of mine and understand how close I am with my parents.” Although Antoniello-Foley didn’t exit Love Is Blind with Vito Salamone, she did align with him on this very important subject, and Salamone was ultimately her No. 1 pick. “I guess there’s still more time and time will tell, but he is a great guy,” she says. 

While all three women look fondly on the romances they enjoyed in the pods — Mickale and Faheem say they also had “amazing” and “surprising” connections throughout filming — they have walked away from the series most struck by their newfound relationships with themselves. “I was able to be a lot more open. It just made you more human,” Mickale says. The pods also made Mickale, a glam expert with a beauty stylist business, ready to get in front of the camera and model more after filming. “The experience and that mindset, it was a lesson in that we can’t wait for anything. If we have goals, if we have things that we’re interested in — just do it. If I don’t love me, I can’t expect others to love me,” she adds.

Echoing Mickale, Faheem calls the journey an “emotional vacation” toward self-love. “The whole experience helped me gain a lot of gratitude for the person I've worked really hard to become... and taught me I always am so much there for others and not as much for myself,” she explains. Today, Faheem is working on being less hard on herself and feels more open “to receiving love and giving it” than before her time in the pods.

For her part, Antoniello-Foley is ready to go on more second dates with suitors who may not have made the most stellar first impression. “The pods helped me slow down and really just live in the moment,” she reflects. “You don’t have to be wowed the first time... I wasn’t in love with Vito [from] day one. Not a chance. But we went on another date and then it kept going. That’s where you develop more. It’s the same way in real life now. You can’t just give up after one glass of wine.”

Armed with the lessons of Love Is Blind, Mickale won’t stop until she finds the makings of “a very successful marriage” — with a twist on the experiment. “I do believe that Love Is Blind in general,” she concludes. “But for Chassidy, love becomes blind. I have to grow with you and learn with you. Then it becomes like, ‘I’ll do anything for you’ ” — including, maybe, sharing her deepest thoughts while staring at a glowing blue wall.