Tinder is an app that most college students have, but many have an account for the wrong reasons. For those of you who don't know what Tinder is, it's a dating app in which you swipe right if you like the person, and left if you don't. The app uses your location on your phone to find people within 100 miles of your location, so that you could potentially “match” with someone nearby. A “match” happens when two people like each other, AKA swipe right on each other. The only issue people have with the app when people call it a dating app is that a lot of people on there are on the app mainly for flings or one night stands. That does not account for everyone on the app (obviously) but it is something that a lot of people commonly run into on this application. There are people who meet their long-term boyfriends through this app , kind of like me.

I know what you’re thinking: how could you trust an app to meet someone? There are so many people who pretend to be someone they're not. How can you be safe about it? I’ll get to all of this.

I met my boyfriend on Tinder, and we’ve been together for four months, and I could not be happier. I started talking to him late July, and it started off as just innocent messages and, as people do, we began to text. We were just getting to know each other, talking about life, and who we really were. I still wasn't sure how it was gonna go at that point because I had a lot of experience with people on Tinder either wanting only a sexual encounter, or the person mysteriously stops talking to me altogether - so, I still had my guard up.

I wasn't sure how to feel about the situation until I had the opportunity to Facetime him and actually see and talk to him. As cheesy as it may sound, as soon as I Facetimed him, we clicked. I was instantly comfortable talking to him, with no awkward silences, no sketchiness - just two people having a conversation as if we’d known each other for years. This was the moment I knew I had feelings for him, and I wanted to meet him. At this point we had planned to meet in the city closest to me: New Haven, CT. Once we met, about a month after we started talking, we made things official.

Here’s the big question someone may have: how do you go about this in the right way? And, more importantly, the safe way? I have personally built a system for this, because my safety is a number one priority.

The smartest thing to do first is to message the person and get to know them for at the least a few weeks. Someone looking for a one night stand will make it well known at this point - some may even make it known within minutes. That’s how I would weed them out, typically.

The second step I always took was to arrange to Facetime them (or any other form of video chat), so you get a face-to-face vibe on who they are - because anyone can seem like a great guy/girl over text. If a guy continuously avoids video chatting, that should set off some type of worry in you. When they’re avoiding it, it probably means in some way that they aren't who they say they are.

Lastly when meeting up with the person, meet in public - this way if any funny business happens there are many witnesses and people of authority nearby. An extra precaution I took was to bring my parents with me to pick my now current boyfriend up, and stay in the same area of New Haven in which we were having dinner, to stay on the safe side.

Thankfully, my boyfriend turned out to be exactly who he said he was, and my parents never had to step in, in any way. This goes to prove that even the most dangerous of things could become one of the best things, taking a chance could turn out to make you really happy. Tinder isn't for everyone, but it is possible to carry out successful relationships through this app.