The first Golden Bachelor couple, who met on the show last fall and married in a live ABC televised wedding in January, are divorcing.
Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist announced the news on Good Morning America today.
“Theresa and I have had a number of heart-to-heart conversations, and we’ve looked closely at our situation, our living situation, so forth and we’ve kind of come to the conclusion mutually that it’s probably time for us to dissolve our marriage,” Turner told Juju Chang in the GMA interview.
“Get a divorce?” Chang asked. “Yes,” Turner replied.
Watch the GMA segment below.
Said Nist, “We have received so much love and support from so many people who watched The Golden Bachelor and I don’t think we can tell you how many people told us that it gave them so much hope. We want none of that to change for anybody.”
The couple were vague, to say the least, about what went wrong in the marriage.
“The thing that strikes me the most in our conversations,” Turner said, “it’s been how dedicated both of us are to our families … So we look at these situations and I think we just feel like it’s best for the happiness of each of us to, to live apart.”
“I still love this person,” Turner added. “There’s no doubt in my mind, I still am in love with her. I root for her every day.” Nist responded, “Yeah, I still love him.”
The couple said they would return the wedding rings that ABC purchased for the show. “I think that’s the rule,” Nist said, with Turner adding, “But you know what? We don’t have to give back the memories.” The couple confirmed they had a prenuptial agreement in place.
The Golden Bachelor, a Bachelor spin-off featuring seniors, was a ratings success for ABC; The Golden Wedding on January 4 reached 7.13M viewers across linear and streaming, according to Nielsen data. . A spin-off, The Golden Bachelorette, will air this fall.
In her on-air wrap-up after the interview, GMA‘s Chang said of the divorce announcement, “It’s a head-scratcher.”
