For better or worse. In sickness and in health. Whether these old-school values make it into Jess Quinn and her new fiancé Todd’s vows hasn’t been decided. However, they’re rules the couple already live by.
By her own admission, the author, body-image advocate and Dancing With The Stars favourite hasn’t been her active, go-getting self in the two and a half years they’ve been together, battling injury and a newly diagnosed chronic condition.
But through it all, software developer Todd has quietly been an unwavering support – the first boyfriend Jess could truly be herself with, after having her leg amputated as part of her fight against bone cancer when she was just nine.
So when the 33-year-old surprised her by proposing during her 30th birthday celebrations in Fiji, Jess had no hesitation in saying, “Yes, yes, yes!”
She tells Woman’s Day, “Todd’s amazing. He met me at one of my lowest points, but I’m starting to see the light at the end of the very painful tunnel. I never thought I’d find someone who I could be like I am around my family, crawling around without my leg on. I feel so relaxed with him.”
The smitten pair met on a dating app after New Zealand’s first lockdown in 2020. Jess had been single for a while and was living in the home she bought with her sister Abby. She wasn’t confident about dating again and had a habit of deleting the app minutes after uploading her profile.
“That night, my sister was going out with her partner and I was feeling extra-lonely,” recalls Jess. “She said, ‘You need to download the app and it still needs to be on your phone when I get home.'”
An obliging Jess connected with Todd and they arranged to meet for a drink, where they filled five hours talking. She thought he was “really nice, really thoughtful”, but she worried about telling him about her prosthetic leg.
“Luckily he mentioned seeing me on Dancing With The Stars and my whole body relaxed,” remembers Jess, joking that his whole family voted for her in the 2018 DWTS final, but Todd actually supported the show’s winner, Samantha Hayes.
Within weeks, however, the daters were separated by another lockdown and had to resort to FaceTime chats. But by Auckland’s third lockdown, they were living together and had adopted their pup Scout, who came into their lives when Jess was at her most immobile, thwarted by a groin injury.
The injury was slowly improving when her foot, which is now her “knee” joint, started to swell and she couldn’t wear her prosthetic. It was two years of barely being able to walk, let alone run like she used to. And through months of rehab and mental healing, Todd was there to support her.
Jess’ memoir Still Standing: What I’ve Learnt From A Life Lived Differently – her account of overcoming tragedy to become an advocate for positive body image and mental wellness – purposely ends amid that challenging time. In typical Jess style, she doesn’t want to mislead people that life is rosy from here on out.
“I didn’t want it to be this book where I went through cancer, had a hard time and then lived this amazing life. We all go through ups and downs, so it showed the reality. It’s a journey that’s still going, as opposed to something I overcame.”
Indeed, since writing the book, Jess has undergone surgery that saw her diagnosed with endometriosis, a painful, incurable gynaecological condition, which has inspired her to help other women with the disorder.
A week-long break in Fiji was intended to be time to refuel, but Todd had other plans, dropping down on one knee and presenting her with a pear-shaped diamond solitaire ring from The Diamond Shop before a sunset picnic.
“To know he’d been planning this for months is mind-blowing,” smiles Jess. “I’m an introvert. I’d said, ‘When it happens, just don’t do it with lots of people around because I’d hate everyone watching.’ It was so beautiful, I just started bawling my eyes out. He did it all as I would have wanted it.”
When asked what makes Jess so special, Todd tells us, “I’ve never felt about anyone the way I feel about her. When she does the smallest, most seemingly insignificant things, I think about it
all day and smile. We have a lot of fun together, but we’re also the perfect pair to tackle whatever life might throw our way.”
They think the wedding will be sooner rather than later, and Jess counts herself lucky her mother Debby owns a wedding company, Wildly, Madly, Deeply. She says, “I’ve never really grown up dreaming about weddings of any big scale, but that engagement was just so special and there are only a few of these big moments in life, so it’ll be really nice to celebrate.”
