'Taylor Swift was my ultimate single-girl companion. Now she belongs to someone else.'

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I never thought Taylor Swift would be the person to break me open. 

For most of my twenties, I wasn't a Swiftie. I rolled my eyes at the fandom, convinced I wasn't "that girl". And then love — or whatever diluted, toxic knock-off version of it I kept subscribing to — came along and wrecked me. Suddenly, I was the girl gasping on the bathroom floor, mascara running like a deleted scene from Girls, texting my friends unhinged things like, "Do you think he's just busy or possibly dead?"

And in that silence, there was Taylor.

Watch: Jessie shares why she believes Taylor is performing at the Super Bowl on Mamamia Out Loud. Post continues below.

Her voice didn't just soundtrack my heartbreaks, it explained them to me. She took my incoherent rage, my pathetic 3am sobs, my long-winded Notes app novels to men who didn't deserve a single emoji — and turned them into art. 

Suddenly, I realised I wasn't alone. Someone out there got me. She had already named the feelings I couldn't find words for, as if she'd been hiding under my bed, spying on every bad decision and making a setlist out of them. She convinced me that maybe, despite all the chaos, despite the heartbreaks and humiliations, I was going to be okay. 

And now, I feel like she's gone. Not dead — worse. Engaged. Taylor Swift, my ultimate single-girl friend, has left the group chat. 

Taylor is engaged and now I feel…alone. Image: Instagram.

Even though she has always been "defined" (at least publicly) by her high-profile relationships, she was still ours. The patron saint of slightly messy women in their 20s and 30s. A beacon for those of us who keep giving our hearts away to men who can't commit to dinner plans, let alone forever, and then patch ourselves back together with group chat screenshots, cheap tequila shots and therapy receipts.

And just like Taylor, the biggest learning moments of my life have come through relationships. The feminist in me cringes at that, but it's true; I've never felt more in touch with myself than in the moments I've had to glue my heart back together with shaky hands and supermarket wine. 

And Taylor has always been there, her music like a mirror held up to my mess. 

The eras of Taylor map perfectly onto the eras of Jess. Red was my bad boy era — the guy so obviously wrong but who I thought I could fix (spoiler: I could not). Red was all-consuming, destructive love; the delusion that pain is proof that it's real. 

Then came 1989: the sparkling rebirth. I didn't fully get it at first, but years later, when I was going through my divorce, it made sense. Suddenly the songs about shaking it off and dancing alone in your room weren't just catchy bops, they were survival manuals. 

Lover looked like pastel skies and butterflies on the surface, but underneath it hummed with anxiety. Joy tinged with the terror that it might vanish in an instant. That was me, trying to settle into long-term happiness with a man who promised forever but made me feel like a placeholder. Smiling on the outside, spiralling on the inside.

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A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift)

Midnights was insomnia on vinyl. Taylor's "13 sleepless nights" felt like she had live-streamed my 2am spirals: staring at the ceiling, retracing every mistake, wondering how the hell I ended up here again.

The killer? The Tortured Poets Department. A doomed, intoxicating love set to music, released just months before my own gutting heartbreak, it became one of the only things able to keep me upright. I didn't just sing 'The Smallest Man That Ever Lived', I wailed it — sometimes into the void, sometimes into a glass of $5 Pinot Noir, sometimes into the cracks of my bathroom tiles. It felt like she had written it just for me. Just for us, the girls who give too much to men who deserve nothing. 

And now we're here. On the cusp of The Life of a Showgirl and with an engagement announcement making worldwide news. 

Taylor's next chapter is not heartbreak, not reinvention, but marriage. Travis Kelce isn't just another boyfriend; he is endgame. He's different. 

Their love story is loud, proud and unapologetically joyful — no secrecy, no shadows. The type of love those of us who seem to be perpetually single scroll past on Instagram with equal parts awe and nausea. After decades of dissecting heartbreak with near surgical precision, Taylor is now living the fairytale in real time.

Taylor Swift finally has her well-deserved fairy tale. Image: Instagram.

I'm thrilled for her. I really am. But I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a selfish pang of grief. Because when your ultimate single-girl co-conspirator finds her Happily Ever After, it leaves the rest of us still out here — dirty martini in hand, unhinged text drafts at the ready — wondering, "who's going to scream 'f*** the patriarchy' with me at 2am now?"

Taylor Swift has been my chaos translator, my heartbreak companion, my unofficial therapist. And while I'll always love her, I can't shake the feeling that her engagement announcement signifies the end of an era.  Her future is now sourdough starters and Kansas City sunsets. Mine is still Hinge date disasters, heartbreak hangovers and the exhausting search for something — anything — that won't destroy me. 

So yes, Taylor, I'm happy for you. But I'm also quietly mourning the loss of my ultimate single-girl soundtrack. 

If you need me today, I'll be at the bottle shop, buying a bottle of cheap-ass, screw-top rosé, whisper-screaming 'All Too Well (10 Minute Version)' into the void.

Just a girl in her thirties, feral in both eyeliner and spirit, waiting for the next song to save her.

Feature image: Instagram.