The Golden Bachelor star Gerry Turner has teased the ending of his groundbreaking season and revealed if he has any regrets about his journey to find a forever partner.
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Now that filming has wrapped, Gerry, 72, hinted he's happy and content during an interview with Entertainment Weekly.
"This is a great day, isn't it?" Gerry said earlier this month, suggesting he may currently be in love.
"I'm so pleasantly surprised by how things ended, there's absolutely no regrets."
Gerry shared how he hopes his story on The Golden Bachelor will inspire and empower fellow "Boomers" -- people in his senior age group -- to not give up on love and to actively seek it out.
"I hope they all realize that if they stay open to opportunity, those things can and will come to them," Gerry insisted.
"They can't sit by and wait for something to happen; they have to make it happen. They can still find someone if they want to."
Although The Golden Bachelor cast faced a busy filming schedule that resulted in a bit of sleep deprivation throughout the course of filming -- to a much lesser extent than typical The Bachelor and The Bachelorette stars, according to the show's producers -- Gerry joked about how he feels this is still not the time to catch up on his rest.
"I'd really rather go a little skimpy on the sleep and enjoy every moment right now. I do realize that my 15 minutes of fame will be over shortly, and I'll want to enjoy as much as I can," Gerry said.
When cameras began rolling on The Golden Bachelor, Gerry had a lineup of 22 beautiful and poised bachelorettes to choose from, all ranging in age from 60 through 75.
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These accomplished "golden" women -- including former The Bachelor star Matt James' mother, Patty James -- took time away from their children, grandchildren, and established lives at home to hopefully rediscover love and maybe even learn something new about themselves.
Not only did EW interview Gerry in September after The Golden Bachelor's filming ended, but they also caught up with him and his bachelorettes as the season progressed.
And it was apparently very difficult for the sweet and kindhearted star of the show -- who is a father and grandfather -- to say goodbye to women week after week and ultimately break nearly two dozen hearts.
"I cried like a baby," Gerry confessed. "With each Rose Ceremony, [host] Jesse Palmer looked at me with more and more concern, because it really felt like the weight of the world was on my chest a couple of times."
Gerry recalled, "I remember walking out of the mansion during one of the Rose Ceremonies and bending over because I really felt like I couldn't catch my breath."
But it's likely Gerry's hardest choices came after hometown and Fantasy Suite dates.
Gerry shared how the women's families were "warm" and "welcoming" for the most part, except for one protective brother who had "made it clear to me that if my intentions weren't honorable and I broke her heart unfairly, that I would pay a consequence for it."
And Gerry gushed about how his Fantasy Suites allowed him to connect "intellectually and emotionally" with his top picks. Gerry made it known that this special off-camera time was more about establishing a deep connection rather than a physical one.
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An actual golden rose was showcased on The Golden Bachelor set, but it has yet to be revealed if Gerry ended up giving the rose to his last woman standing.
Given many of these women have already faced heartache and loss in their lives, viewers probably don't want to watch these women cry and break down when facing rejection.
However, The Golden Bachelor executive producer Jason Ehrlich assured EW that the women handled their breakups with Gerry with class, grace and resilience.
"These women have a lot more life experience to know that they're strong enough to handle this," Jason explained during filming.
"When they leave the mansion, they are certainly disappointed, they are certainly bummed. But they aren't devastated in any way. There is this feeling that, 'I'm glad that I put myself out there, and I will continue to put myself out there for the next adventure.'"
Gerry signed up to be The Golden Bachelor after losing his high school sweetheart and late wife, Toni Turner, to complications from a bacterial infection in 2017.
The pair had been married for 43 years and welcomed two daughters, Angie and Jenny, together. Gerry also has two granddaughters, Charlee and Payton, and lives on a beautiful lake in Indiana.
"I really believe people are designed to live with someone," Gerry shared.
"Living alone, it's obviously lonely, but I also think that we're not our best selves when we're not with the right person. Consequently, I had kind of stalled."
And even if Gerry wasn't their "right person," many of the bachelorettes seemed to enjoy their experience on the ABC reality dating series as a whole.
April Kirkwood, a 65-year-old therapist from Florida, for example, said, "One thing I realized from this show, I am open to falling in love. Whether it's with him or someone else, I am lonely, and I am interested in having someone to share that space with. I think this is a gift from the universe."
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About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski
