The Golden Bachelorette star Joan Vassos has admitted that, initially, she thought looking for love on reality TV would be a betrayal against her late husband John Vassos.
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Joan was married for 32 years to John, who died in January 2021 from pancreatic cancer.
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Joan, who didn't have much luck with dating, decided to appear on Gerry Turner's The Golden Bachelor season in 2023, about two-and-a-half years after John passed away.
And ABC announced Joan as the star of the inaugural season of The Bachelorette in May.
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When asked what her late husband would think of this opportunity, Joan told Entertainment Tonight while on location of her season, "I thought a lot about this before I was ever on The Golden Bachelor. I kind of had those feelings already, or those thoughts."
"And I had a conversation with a friend of mine," continued the 61-year-old mother, grandmother and school administrator from Rockland, MD.
"I was like, 'I have the offer to be on it, but I'm a little afraid that it's not honoring his memory by doing this, like, I'm betraying him in some way.'"
Joan acknowledged, "Obviously I'm not," but she added, "I had that feeling, for some reason. And [my friend] said, 'You are not! He would've loved this!' And he would have. He loved reality TV."
The Golden Bachelorette star said of John, "He was a 'dive in with both feet' to anything you do [type of person]. So I think he's up there going, 'Look, that's my wife down there! She's doing this!' I feel like maybe he had a little hand in me actually getting here."
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John apparently told Joan before his death that he didn't want her to be alone for the rest of her life.
"He told me right before he passed away, he said, 'You need to go out and find somebody else. You were the best wife in the world and I want you to be happy,'" Joan recalled.
"So he gave me this wonderful gift before he died, and he said, 'Go and do something.' And so when he said, 'Do something,' here I am!"
In a new promo of The Golden Bachelorette that aired during Jenn Tran's The Bachelorette season on Monday, July 29, Joan was shown sitting down with her kids, grandchildren, mother, and mother-in-law for dinner.
Joan's son Nick -- one of her four kids -- sweetly tells his mother in the footage, "We want you to be happy," and then Joan toasts to her journey to find love and mentions her late husband.
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"Thank you so much for all your support," Joan tells her loved ones.
"I'm not here to replace Dad, I just want our family to be whole again. So, let's cheers: cheers to a great adventure!"
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The Golden Bachelorette's inaugural season will premiere Wednesday, September 18 at 8PM ET/PT on ABC, and all broadcasts will be available for streaming on Hulu the next day.
Joan had quit The Golden Bachelor, which wrapped in November 2023 on ABC, a couple of weeks into filming last year to help her daughter recover from postpartum depression at home.
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"I so thought that I was going to be that girl who left that nobody remembers. I truly believed that was going to be the outcome," Joan told Entertainment Tonight, reflecting back on her early The Golden Bachelor departure.
"I really was sad about that, honestly, because I loved being here. I think the process worked. I was sad when I had to leave, so having the opportunity to come back and [having] people actually remember me a little bit [is amazing]."
On The Golden Bachelor: The Women Tell All late last year, Joan got emotional when watching her journey back on the show, and she told host Jesse Palmer how she felt really bad about disappointing and hurting Gerry.
Joan apparently thought she and Gerry had "a good chance" of working out as a couple had she stayed.
Joan had said a part of her even wondered if Gerry was going to leave the show and chase her down in order to be with her. (Gerry ended up getting engaged and married to his The Golden Bachelor winner, Theresa Nist, but the pair split in April and have since finalized their divorce).
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Joan told The Wrap in November 2023 that, after leaving Gerry during Week 2 of The Golden Bachelor season, she briefly considered returning to the show and resuming filming once she helped her daughter because she felt like she had "unfinished business."
However, Joan soon came to realize that her daughter's mental health was still suffering after giving birth and she needed to stay by her side.
ABC previously teased that Joan will bring "grace and charm" to viewers' television screens on Wednesday nights this fall.
"She is a remarkable woman whose life has been defined by her resilience, zest for adventure and strong family values. It was those family values that led to her heartbreaking decision to leave The Golden Bachelor," ABC wrote in a press release for the show.
"Despite that and other challenges she's faced along the way... [Joan] remains an embodiment of strength and grace as a devoted mother of four, grandmother of two, and school administrator, while finding solace in the music of Elton John, spending time with her dog, and cooking."
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Joan told ET that going into filming for The Golden Bachelorette, she was looking for a family man, a gentleman, and someone who is very polite, charming, endearing and adventurous.
Joan admitted she had "planned on" having all those adventures with her late husband.
Joan wrote of John on Instagram in January, "He was the husband that always made me feel safe and cherished. He was the parent that was always the fun one because that's all he knew how to do... lucky kids because fun in his book was generally epic. I could go on for hours."
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Click here to read episode-by-episode spoilers about how Jenn's The Bachelorette season unfolds, including who Jenn picks as her winner and runner-up.
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