The Golden Bachelor winner Theresa Nist has disputed Gerry Turner's public claims about why their relationship ended.

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According to Theresa, the real reason her relationship with Gerry ended is still not public knowledge.

RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELOR' FRANCHISE COUPLES NOW: WHO IS STILL TOGETHER?? (PHOTOS)

"I don't know if I'll ever say what the reason was for me," Theresa told Us Weekly in a recent interview.

She added, "But I will say that it's really hard to know somebody in that amount of time."

Gerry and Theresa got engaged on The Golden Bachelor finale, which aired in November 2023, and then they got married in January 2024 for a televised special on ABC.

Gerry and Theresa announced their split in April 2024 and finalized their divorce in June.

At the time, the pair said distance played a major role in the demise of their relationship because Gerry wanted to stay close to his family in Indiana while Theresa wanted to continue her finance job in New Jersey.

But nearly one year later, Theresa is singing a different tune about what went wrong by saying distance was actually "not the reason" for their breakup.

"But I will give kudos to [The Golden Bachelorette star] Joan Vassos, who started her season by saying, 'I'm not moving and I don't expect that person to move,'" Theresa said.

"I think they went into the inaugural season treating us just like the young people who are just starting their lives. They together can go and find their way and decide where to live. But when you're talking about older people who have homes and they've got community and they've got children and, maybe, grandchildren, that's a difference."

Theresa applauded Joan and her The Golden Bachelorette winner, Chock Chapple, for making it work.

"And maybe that could've worked [for Gerry and I]," noted Theresa, who previously claimed Gerry had backed out of their post-show plan to move to Charleston, SC, together.

"[Golden producers] have to be open-minded to that. Either that, or have it in the same city or the same state or neighboring states. But that was not the reason."

Theresa also made it very clear that Gerry's cancer had nothing to do with their breakup either.

"I want to say this: his illness was not the reason whatsoever," Theresa insisted, referring to how Gerry was diagnosed with an incurable bone marrow cancer called Waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia while they were still together.

RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELORETTE' COUPLES NOW: WHOM DID 'THE BACHELORETTE' STARS AND THEIR BACHELOR PICKS ULTIMATELY END UP WITH?! (PHOTOS)  

When Gerry only went public with his cancer diagnosis in December, he said he had informed Theresa about his health crisis in February 2024.

"The importance of finding the way with Theresa was still there, but it became less of a priority... [When] you regroup and you realize what's important to you, that's where you start to move forward," Gerry told People at the time when justifying his divorce from Theresa.

"And I hope that people understand in retrospect now that that had a huge bearing on my decisions and I think probably Theresa's as well."

But Theresa apparently disagrees with Gerry's take on the situation.

"That was never a discussion. I was quite surprised to read that. He said that [about his reasoning for our divorce] and said he would imagine it was my reason too. It was not at all my reason," Theresa told Us.

"I would've stuck with him through thick. My husband of 42 years, Billy, was sick for the last five years of his life and I stayed with him and took care of him. He said, 'It weighed heavily into my decision,' I think, and, 'I would imagine into Theresa's too.'"

Theresa went on to claim that Gerry "just imagined that" because "there was no discussion" about it at all.

According to Theresa, when she learned about Gerry's cancer, he hadn't experienced any symptoms or started any kind of treatment yet.

"And thank God," she noted. "I'm so happy for him. I want him to live a long, healthy, prosperous, wonderful life. I'm rooting for him. I don't want him to be sick."

Theresa refused to share the real reason why she didn't want to continue a life with Gerry, but she continues to hint that she didn't know him very well.

"After the show was over, it was just a whirlwind of excitement and we were caught up in everything and there were interviews and we were going to events," Theresa explained.

"It was also an abbreviated version of The Bachelor. We only had one-hour episodes. And so the amount of time that I was with him was what you saw on TV. There was no other casual interaction, like, there might be on Bachelor in Paradise where you can hang out."

Theresa confessed that she and Gerry "probably should have waited" to get married as a result.

"That would've been the right thing to do," the mother and grandmother admitted.

RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELOR' COUPLES NOW: WHO DID 'THE BACHELOR' STARS AND THEIR BACHELORETTE PICKS ACTUALLY END UP MARRYING? (PHOTOS)

However, Theresa claimed The Golden Bachelor producers presented the wedding to her and Gerry as a "now or never" decision.

"It's not that they were saying to us, 'Okay, we're offering you this wedding and you can do it six months, a year, two years, whenever you want to,'" she clarified, adding how the decision "had to be made quickly."

Theresa therefore recalled, "We said, 'Okay, if we're really going to go through with this and we're going to get married, if we do it this way, we can get the wedding of our dreams. It'll be spectacular.' It was a quick decision."

Theresa also said her and Gerry's kids were "so excited" and "so supportive" about the wedding as well.

"We all believed it was going to work," Theresa acknowledged.

"We wouldn't have done it [otherwise]. I was in love. I really believed this was forever and for the rest of my life. We all thought that. I mean, listen to our wedding vows and what my daughter said and what his daughter said. We truly, truly believed it."

But when Theresa's relationship ended, she had to return to reality.

"When it all ended, it was like, 'Okay, I'm back to my regular life and what is life like?' I just had to step back and just reexamine who I was. It's been a lot of introspection," Theresa said.

And when looking back on her choices in hindsight, Theresa said she doesn't like to regret anything.

RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELOR' FRANCHISE COUPLES NOW: WHO IS STILL TOGETHER?? (PHOTOS)

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About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski

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