Jessica Batten and Benjamin McGrath Courtesy Jessica Batten/Instagram
Married bliss! One year later Jessica Batten Benjamin McGrathThe couple were engaged and secretly got married.
“Mr. & Mrs.,” the Love is blind 36-year-old alum captioned an Instagram post on Friday, September 16, of their wedding photos. This revealed that they had tied the knot on August 24,
Batten and the 35 years-old foot and ankle surgeon had intended to have a grand wedding ceremony. But COVID-19 postponements, physical distance and physical distance soon complicated matters.
Benjamin McGrath, Jessica Batten Courtesy Jessica Batten/Instagram
“Amidst COVID and with family health and logistics with travel, we found ourselves between a rock and a hard place in trying to plan the wedding in 2022,” the pair told Brides Friday’s magazine “We tried to make it all work. We considered moving the location to Chicago or moving our date. Ultimately, we decided that we needed more time to pull off the massive celebration that we thought was worthy for our family and friends.”
They added: “Considering the timing we are looking for in terms of family planning, we came to the conclusion that we would elope in 2022 and make big plans for a celebration down the road.”
Batten and McGrath — who shares daughter Poppy, 6, and son Ethan, 5, with a former partner — wed at the Santa Barbara Courthouse last month with just two couples as witnesses.
“[It’s] a classic landmark in our favorite city; the city where we fell in love,” Batten, who wore a Reem Acra gown, told the magazine. “As we started to plan our elopement, the courthouse became an obvious choice. … On the day of the wedding, our planners found a private nook in the courtyard, completely surrounded by palm trees – the perfect site to share our vows.”
McGrath proposed to McGrath in September 2021 after they had been dating for one year.
“It was a complete surprise, she had no idea,” he exclusively told Us Weekly One month later. “One day, I was just, like, ‘I’m going to do it, we gotta make this happen.’ … We’d never talked about a ring or anything like that, so I kind of planned it around her dad coming into town, with him kind of facilitating the surprise. And it turned out pretty good, I think we got her pretty good.”
The Netflix personality admittedly felt completely “overwhelmed” seeing her beau down on one knee.
“It took me a minute, but I recited a line from Suits,” she recalled to Use In October 2021. “When we were [doing]Long-distance, long-distance, it was us that we were watching Suits, and we would just be on FaceTime and set the phone there and we’d just be watching together. So instead of saying yes, I said, ‘Do I have a brain in my head? Do I have a heart in my chest?’ And he liked that. Then, he forgot to put the ring on, so I reminded him, ‘You have to put the ring on now.’”
Batten — who plans to celebrate her nuptials with a large party next year — previously accepted a proposal from Mark CuevasDuring season 1 Love is blind. Batten ended their engagement after a long and difficult journey. He also expressed concern about their age gap. Cuevas was married for his part. Aubrey RaineyThis was earlier in the month.
