In his upcoming book about his conversion to Catholicism, Vice President JD Vance dishes about his dating life before meeting his “soulmate.”
Vance, 41, shared an excerpt of his book, Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith, with USA Today for Mother’s Day on Sunday, announcing the exclusive on social media.
“This is a particularly special mother’s day in the Vance clan, as Usha is about to become a mom for the fourth time,” the vice president wrote on X. “We thought it would be fun to put out a little excerpt from my new book about the early days of our relationship.
“To all the moms out there, but especially to Usha: Happy Mother’s Day!”
In the excerpt, Vance describes a time when he was helping his friend, Mike, with his relationship woes, only to note that he himself was not too concerned about the idea of heartache.
“I hadn’t felt the same heartache in my own dating life,” Vance wrote in the excerpt. “For a couple of years during and after college, I’d dated a girl named Mary. She was sweet, and she wanted the same things out of life that I did: a nice house, a decent job, and a couple of kids. My family got along with her fine. No relationship is perfect, but nothing seemed like a deal breaker.”
“Still, I could never escape the feeling that, as much as I liked her, if she were to dump me the next day, I’d get over it quickly,” he added. “I’d never react the way Mike had reacted to his breakup with Jessica.”
The Yale Law graduate writes that he told his friend, “I don’t think I have that gene or something,” referring to the idea of falling “head over heels for a girl.”
“Some are better and some are worse. I could rate Mary on all these objective criteria, and she’s mostly great. But would I sob if she broke up with me? No way,” he wrote. “Isn’t that a problem?”
The vice president then writes about how he became “obsessed” with his future wife, Usha, while still dating Mary.
“A few months after that conversation, I was still dating Mary – now long distance, from New Haven, Connecticut, where I was a couple of months into my first year of law school. I was walking late at night on an unusually cold and rainy fall day. New Haven is spooky in the fog, and the rain had emptied out the streets. And the whole time I was thinking about another student: Usha Bala Chilukuri," Vance wrote.
“‘Dude, I think I’m obsessed with this chick in my small group. It’s unhealthy,’” he recalls telling his friend Mike about Usha.
The Hillbilly Elegy author describes his future wife as “smarter than everyone,” and that she had “the most amazing posture.”
He writes that he broke up with Mary not just because of the long distance between them, but that he “couldn’t imagine settling for anyone else” than Usha.
“‘I will marry this girl,’ I told my friends. ‘Or I will be a lifelong bachelor,’” Vance wrote.
Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, has faced backlash over his newfound faith.
His upcoming book about his faith journey after a stint as an atheist features a United Methodist church on the cover rather than a Catholic-style cathedral. Vance has no connection to the Methodist congregation.
Most notably, the Catholic convert has defended his boss, President Donald Trump, as he has lashed out at Pope Leo XIV over his criticism of Trump’s war on Iran.
Vance told the leader of the Roman Catholic Church last month to “be careful” when discussing theology and that the pontiff’s comments need to be “anchored in the truth.”
