Colton Underwood's Ex-Girlfriend Cassie Randolph Is Processing 'Bachelor' Alum Coming Out As Gay
Apr. 27 2021, Updated 4:53 p.m. ET
After recovering from a very public and messy breakup, Cassie Randolph is now faced with the fact that her ex-boyfriend, former Bachelor star Colton Underwood is gay.
And it's news the 25-year-old Season 23 Bachelor winner is still "still processing."
"She was not made aware in advance that he was going to be on GMA doing a tell-all," a source told Us Weekly following Underwood's pre-taped Good Morning America interview, which aired Wednesday morning. "To be honest, she hasn't really had time to navigate how she feels about it yet."
During the candid sit-down, Underwood, 29, opened up to Robin Roberts about his lifelong struggles with his sexuality, noting he's "felt different" since the age of 6. Though at the time he couldn't process what exactly it was that made him feel different, he knew he was "more emotional" than his male peers. It wasn't until he was a teenager that he realized he was "more attracted to the boys and the men."
"I couldn't process it, and I couldn't put my finger on what it was until high school, my freshman year, when I knew I was gay," the former football player explained. "By that time, I had already grown up in the Catholic Church, I had gone to Catholic grade school. I had learned in the Bible that gay is a sin."
So he went on with his life, living as a straight man.
After making headlines over his virginity on Becca Kufrin's season of The Bachelorette, Colton was named the Bachelor in 2018, a moment during which he recalled "thanking [God] for making me straight." He hoped the gig would finally lead him to a wife and kids.
During his March 2019 finale, Colton begged Cassie not to quit the show, which led to a post-series relationship. They called it quits for good in May 2020.
"Post-breakup was an emotional journey for her and it was painful at times," the Us Weekly source said. "She has taken a lot of steps to move on in life and has been focused on her well-being and her happiness. She has not been in communication with Colton."
Three months after the former couple's final split, Randolph was granted a restraining order against Underwood, accusing him of harassing and stalking her. He denied the claims, and the order was dropped two months later.
Though he did not go into detail about their relationship and its tumultuous end, Underwood did apologize to Randolph during his chat with Roberts.
"I got into a place with my personal life that was dark and bad, and I can list a bunch of different things, but they'd all be excuses," he said. "I'd like to say sorry for how things ended. I messed up. I made a lot of bad choices."
"I loved everything about her, and it's hard for me to articulate exactly what my emotions were in going through that relationship with her was because I obviously had an internal fight going on," he added. "I would just say that I'm sorry from the bottom of my heart. I'm sorry for any pain and emotional stress I caused. I wish that it wouldn't have happened the way that it did. I wish that I had been courageous enough to fix myself before I broke anybody else."