Lifelong Disney fan Madisen Gulledge found her real-life fairytale love story through a social media mix-up.
The romance began in 2019 while she was participating in the Disney College Program, an internship for college students and recent graduates who live and work at the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida.
She frequently went to see Finding Nemo: The Musical with her friends, sometimes attending “a few times a week.”
Their routine involved posting snippets of the show on Instagram Stories and tagging the cast to “hype them up,” which is how she ended up tagging and eventually marrying the man inside the fish costume.
“I accidentally tagged the wrong person in a video one day, and they corrected me on who it was (my now husband, Casey). That one little mistake is what put me on his radar,” the 28-year-old mom said.
The small mistake had a big impact, causing her and Casey to start talking on social media.
“Our first date happened the very first day we met in person. My friend and I had been invited to meet the cast by one of his friends who thought we’d be cute together, and that was the first time I met him in full costume, which feels very on-brand for our story,” Gulledge recounted.
“After the show, he mentioned he was about to get off work and asked if I wanted to hang out for a bit,” she continued. “I was internally geeking out, but I tried to play it cool and said, ‘Sure.’”
They remained in Disney’s Animal Kingdom for the entire night, enjoying attractions and getting snacks.
“It was simple, but it felt special, like this surreal little Disney day that somehow turned into our first date,” she recalled. “After a few more park days together, we officially started dating in June 2019.”
Their relationship started with “immediate best friend energy.” Both from Michigan and knowing the same people, they quickly bonded. She shared, “Even before we officially started dating, we both kind of had this unspoken feeling of, ‘Oh… this might be it.'”
It felt “easy,” “unconventional, but at the same time, everything about us made sense.”
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The couple’s relationship has since blossomed into a nearly seven-year journey. They became engaged in 2021, married in 2022, and celebrated the birth of their daughter, Harper, in 2023.
“When I look at it like that, it feels like we packed a whole lifetime into just a few years,” Gulledge reminisced.
Although she doesn’t visit Disney as frequently as she used to, her husband continues to be involved in the musical.
“We still go about once a week, and most of the time, it’s to see him perform. We joke that it’s ‘bring your girls to work’ day,” she stated. “Our 2-year-old has seen Finding Nemo so many times that she knows all the songs and can basically quote every line and even sometimes performs the choreography.”
Gulledge finds the entire experience “surreal to think about.”
She said, “The moral of the story is don’t be afraid to shoot your shot! Who knew a few DMs and Disney trips could lead to marriage, a family and a lifetime of memories?”
Gulledge told People, “From a fangirl sitting in the audience to marrying someone from the cast and now bringing our daughter to see her dad perform on the same stage. It’s a story I’ll never get tired of telling, and honestly, it reminds me every day how unexpected life can be in the best ways.”
