Despite experiencing a few bumps along the road, Steven McBee Jr. and his girlfriend, Calah Jackson, are still going strong.
“We were on a break right up until filming almost started for this new show,” Steven, 31, exclusively told Us Weekly, while talking about The McBee Dynasty: Real American Cowboys.
Steven met Calah while on the reality show Joe Millionaire: For Richer or Poorer, which aired in January 2022. He admitted that the couple have had their “ups and downs” since filming the Fox dating show, which viewers will witness in The McBee Dynasty: Real American Cowboys.
“So what you see on camera is us trying to figure things out, see if we can make it work and really come together, which I think is really cool because it’s our true conversations that we were having throughout that entire time period,” he explained to Us.
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As for how living together is going, Steven gushed that it’s “going well so far.” He added, “We’ve been really, really solid.”
While it may be smooth sailing for Steven and Calah now, their relationship previously hadn’t gotten the support from his dad, Steve McBee.
“It’s tough,” Steven told Us of the dynamic between Steve and Calah. Steven explained that after leaving Joe Millionaire, he and Calah would “only be together” when they were out at bars or in “kind of rough environments.” Steven added that his dad “never got to see [Calah] for who she is.”
“He only saw her when she was drinking, and that’s not a fair comparison of who she actually is,” Steven said. “And so that’s why I wanted him to, and really all of my family, to see her when she’s just herself out on the farm, just a normal girl and how special she really is as a person.”
When asked if Steve and Calah’s relationship has improved, Steven said “they’re better but they’re not all the way there.”
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Steven’s brother, Jesse McBee, noted that the duo’s romance now has his stamp of approval, explaining, “They’ve both matured quite a bit and have gotten a lot better.”
Jesse added that Calah “fit the description” that Steven had previously given his family of his ideal partner.
“He loves Calah and her type of personality and who she is, and it’s kind of funny that they’ve made it all the way to this show. They’ve been able to be on both of them and different dynamics,” Jesse told Us. “And you get to see that in this one. They’re a lot more mature and kind of get to see their story grow and mature as well.”
Watch The McBee Dynasty: Real American Cowboys on USA Network on Mondays at 11 p.m. ET or stream the full series on Peacock.
Reporting by Christina Garibaldi
