I’m 19 like Love Island’s Gemma Owen – and I would never date a 27-year-old

I still feel as if I completed my A-Levels last week, and often forget I am an adult. I’m definitely not ready to settle down

Being 19, I know for a fact I have not lived my life to the fullest extent – neither has Gemma (ITV2)

How big is too big when it comes to age gap relationships? I have some opinions, after watching Gemma Owen from Love Island recently become entangled with Davide Sanclimenti, who’s 27. Like Gemma, I am 19. And I would never date a 27-year-old.

We’ve also recently seen Gemma’s ex-boyfriend Jacques O’Neill enter the villa. It was revealed that the pair dated for eight months and broke up a year and a half ago; but Jacques is 23, which means she must’ve been dating him when she was 16 and he was 20.

Davide claims he is “ready to settle down”, and is currently making waves after dumping Gemma for Ekin-Su, who’s 27 like him (Gemma, in turn, went off at the recoupling with Luca, who’s 23), but the entire situation has made me consider a key issue: if I’m not anywhere near ready to settle down at 19, then is Gemma? Really? And if she isn’t, then what is she doing on Love Island?

Here’s my perspective, as someone the exact same age as Gemma is now: being only 19, I know for a fact I have not lived my life to the fullest extent. I’ve only ever experienced young love that ended over Snapchat at 17 – and silly situations with guys I met during freshers’ week at university. Does Gemma genuinely believe she is going to find true love and satisfaction with Davide, a man eight years older than her – and is that even what she wants?

I understand her physical attraction to him – and maybe there’s something in the fact that older men can have greater financial stability in comparison to men closer to us in age. I’ve found older guys generally try to win younger women over by being “endearing” and complimentary.

But in my experience, that’s where the attraction ends – and simply becomes unrealistic. I simply don’t have much in common with an older man, compared to, say, someone three years older than I am. We won’t have experienced the same music, the same pop culture, TV or basic life events – the sort of stuff that builds the foundation for a substantial relationship.

With men my own age, or just a few years older, I can discuss the awful trends of 2016, the memes circulating at the time, and the life of pandemic schooling. I wouldn’t be able to share any of those profound experiences with someone eight years older. They wouldn’t understand the struggle of doing A-Levels in a pandemic, or what it was like navigating university life for the first time via Zoom.

Gemma turned 19 in May 2022, making me a mere five months older than her. This means she finished primary school, secondary school and her GCSEs all at the same age as I did. Surely she feels as young as I do? Why wouldn’t she? I still feel as if I completed my A-Levels last week, and often forget I am an adult. I’m definitely not ready to settle down. Perhaps at 27, I would be. But that’s a long, long way off.

At this moment in time, my biggest dreams and aspirations are to finish my degree, continue having the best time with my friends and travelling. Being 27 feels so far away from anything I am used to – I can’t even contemplate trying to compare childhood stories and events to someone of that age.

That doesn’t mean age gaps can’t ever work, of course – they have existed for years. We’ve seen numerous celebrity examples: like Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds, who have 11 years between them; or Jason Statham and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley (20 years). It clearly works for them, so there must be some compatibility there.

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But I keep coming back to the simple fact that at 19, I don’t even know what I want in a relationship, and neither do my friends. And if we don’t know yet, then how similar can those desires really be to whatever a 27-year-old wants? Those eight formative years between us hold so much time and change – both in ourselves as individuals, and in the world around us. It would be no real surprise, surely, if the common ground that most relationships are built on would be harder to find.

Another factor is the power shift within a larger age gap relationship. Age is a powerful tool, and I often find myself assuming people older than me naturally know more and have more power. This might not always be true, but the feeling is there. So, when this translates into relationships, couldn’t it be dangerous? I can’t stop myself worrying that an older man might take control and power in the relationship in a way that would leave it unequal. And I worry it would lead to more serious issues further down the line.

All I know is that at 19, I am way more focused on having fun and working on myself, going on drives with my friends – and living my life to the fullest – without having to think about a future that feels light years away (even if it’s only eight years in reality).

I hope to be a different person at 27, but also one who doesn’t regret growing up at my own pace, having fun and making mistakes – and being as young and as silly as possible while I still can. I just hope Gemma Owen gets to do the same.