Hannah Brown was too cool for the Bachelor franchise. Or so she thought.
“I didn’t aspire to be on The Bachelor,” the Alabama native, 25, revealed in an interview with Marie Claire published on Friday, October 4. “I didn’t watch the show. I thought it was for losers truly.”
However, when Brown realized that all of her friends were either married or engaged, she decided to take action and applied to compete on season 23 of The Bachelor earlier this year. It didn’t go to plan, though. She finished in seventh place, and lead Colton Underwood ultimately found love with Cassie Randolph.
The former pageant queen was given another shot at love when ABC offered her the starring role on The Bachelorette season 15. Finally, things seemed to be going her way. She developed strong feelings for all of her final four suitors: Luke Parker, Peter Weber (who was later named the next Bachelor), Tyler Cameron and Jed Wyatt. Her journey ended with Wyatt, 25, proposing in Greece, but she called off their engagement soon after when she heard conflicting stories about the aspiring singer’s past relationship back home.
“For a year, the only focus that I had was finding a spouse, and then I don’t have one? I was just crushed,” Brown told Marie Claire. With a wave of her hand, she added that she “can’t even remember loving [Wyatt] at this point because it was just so … pfft.”
These days, the reality star is perfectly happy as a single woman.
“I will not settle,” she told the magazine. “It doesn’t matter how lonely it might feel on a Saturday night by myself when I see my friends posting pictures with their husbands or out with the guy they’re dating. I don’t care. I would rather protect [my heart]. … I am totally okay on my own. I don’t want to have to have a man to feel whole. It’s not that I need that to feel like I have a full life. No, I have a full life. Welcome into my life.”
In the meantime, Brown has set her sights on winning the mirrorball trophy on Dancing With the Stars with her pro partner, Alan Bersten.
“I want to be in this competition as long as possible,” she said. “I know I need this growth.”
