Dr. Phil flew a plane on his first date with his wife, Robin: 'I knew I’d be safe with this man'
Dr. Phil McGraw may be known for dealing with the most complicated of relationships and mental health issues on his namesake daytime talkshow. But luckily for him, there wasn’t much doctoring needed when it came to his relationship with his wife, Robin.
In fact, the couple tells Yahoo Lifestyle that their first meeting happened by chance, and they haven’t looked back in the nearly five decades that they’ve been together. Although Phil didn’t seem to have much game when the couple first met.
“The very, very first time that Philip and I saw each other was in his mother and father’s family room,” Robin explains. “I was friends with his sister. So I walk into the room, there he is. He looks up and the first thing he says was, ‘Who are you?”
Neither of them were looking for love at the time, especially since Phil was going back to school for his master’s. But they both felt that everything was quickly falling into place, which became evident when Robin agreed to go on her first airplane ride as their very first date, with Phil as the pilot.
“She said she had never been up in an airplane, which I took as a dare,” Phil says. “So I thought, ‘Well, she wants to get her feet off the ground, we’ll get her feet off the ground.’ So we went up at about 10 o’clock that night.”
Even he admitted that the nighttime ride would have been intimidating for a first time flyer. However, to Phil’s surprise, that’s when Robin knew that she was in love.
“I really go with my gut always. I knew I’d be safe with this man,” she says. “I do believe in love at first sight, and I fell in love with this man on that very first night.”
Through the nearly three years that the couple went on to date, Robin had a full time job at the airport where she worked as an operator that gave landing instructions to planes. But on the night of Valentine’s Day in 1976, Phil radioed as he flew back from a Christmas vacation to ask if she’d be able to squeeze in a date once he landed and her shifted ended.
“‘Sure,'” Robin recalls saying. “And he proposed that night. I was shocked. I really was very surprised. I was the happiest woman in the world.”
“I knew she was the one because I wasn’t looking for the one,” Phil adds. “You’re not thinking about it, you’re not looking, you’re not wondering. And then, I met her and it just didn’t seem like there was much point in doing all of the things I was doing if she wasn’t gonna be involved. That’s how I knew.”
Six months later, on the same day that Phil received his master’s degree, the pair got married at a Baptist church in Wichita Falls, Texas, with the little money that they had.
“Robin had a wedding dress that she paid $100 for,” Phil says. “Put it on layaway, paid five dollars a week on it or something like that to get it out of layaway.”
They both fondly reflect on their memories before their life completely changed with the launch of the famous talkshow, “Dr. Phil” in 2002. The years prior allowed them to build the strong foundation, which has been showcased onscreen in the 17 years since.
“I have been to every taping for 17 years now of the Dr. Phil show. I wouldn’t miss a show,” Robin says. While Phil admits that it’s because “she worked herself in a job” with their now routine exit hand-in-hand.
Before it became routine, however, the couple shares that Phil walking off stage and to his wife was something that happened naturally after the show’s first taping. And it all leads back to their commitment to each other.
“We have always focused on each other. We’ve always made it a point to put each other first,” Robin says. “So it’s just this comfort and this love of our life together that we have, and we never forget that.”
Check your local listings to see what channel and time Dr. Phil is airing in your area Monday thru Friday.
Read more from Yahoo Lifestyle:
• David Tutera and Joey Toth on being the first same-sex couple to marry at their church
• Susan Lucci fell for husband Helmut Huber during her engagement party to another man
• Why it took Maria Menounos and Keven Undergaro nearly 2 decades to get engaged
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