The Bachelor alum Ben Higgins has revealed he and fiancee Jessica Clarke eventually want to adopt children, either in addition to or in lieu of having biological kids of their own.
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ABC will be recapping Ben's The Bachelor season, which aired as Season 20 in 2016, on Monday night's three-hour broadcast of The Bachelor: The Greatest Seasons -- Ever!.
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Although he will have to relive his break up with JoJo Fletcher and engagement to Lauren Bushnell (which ended in May 2017), Ben has moved on and is now happily engaged to Jess Clarke and thinking about their future together.
"[Jess] comes from a family of three siblings in total, and I am an only child. I would love to have two kids," Ben recently told Us Weekly.
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"And when I say 'two kids,' I don't know what that looks like. Jess and I are very interested in adopting. I definitely am excited about the idea of adopting... It would be such a gift to our family I think to do that."
Ben continued, "So if that means that we have two adopted kids, if that means we have three adopted kids, if that means we have kids that are biologically ours, I don't know yet. But we definitely want a family."
Ben admitted, however, he does not want "a massive family."
"I am a pretty big introvert and I really do enjoy my time alone. In a huge family of chaos, it kind of makes me anxious. But I do want our kids to have siblings, if possible, to grow up in this world with," Ben shared.
As far as adopting kids goes, Ben said he loves to experience and celebrate different cultures and so raising children from different backgrounds would be a blessing.
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"How cool would it be if we have a family of all different cultures coming together to celebrate each other?" Ben suggested. "That is heaven to me. That sounds awesome."
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When asked to reveal his timeline for starting a family, Ben pointed out that Jess is 25 years old and he is 31 years old.
"For us as a couple, we have done long distance [dating]. It's important for us to spend some time with just Jess and I," Ben explained.
"I don't know about an exact timeline, but if I had to throw a date out there, it would be like in a year-and-a-half to two-and-a-half years that we'd start the process of trying to figure out what the kids situation is going to look like."
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But Ben noted he wants "a year" alone with Jess to have fun and explore as a couple.
"And she wants a dog," Ben added. "But we travel a lot. So right now, I'm not even in support of getting a dog because I want freedom. So, kids would... probably come after she gets her puppy."
After competing for Kaitlyn Bristowe's heart on The Bachelorette's eleventh season, Ben starred on The Bachelor and famously fell in love with both of his Final 2 bachelorettes, JoJo and Lauren.
Ben ultimately dumped runner-up JoJo Fletcher in favor of winner Lauren Bushnell, who accepted Ben's marriage proposal during the Season 20 finale that aired in March 2016.
After starring on a Bachelor spinoff called Ben & Lauren: Happily Ever After? on Freeform, Ben and Lauren split in May 2017.
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Following his breakup with Lauren, Ben announced he was in a new relationship in January 2019, but he waited several more weeks before revealing his girlfriend's identity and going Instagram official with Jess.
Ben, who lives in Denver, CO, proposed marriage to Jess in late March at her family's home in Tennessee, and the pair has since been self-isolating with each other amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Ben revealed on his The Ben and Ashley I: Almost Famous Podcast in May that he and Jess are "happily engaged" and "having a great time being engaged."
Meanwhile, JoJo and Jordan just celebrated their four-year engagement anniversary and are planning their wedding.
While the couple had set a wedding date for June 13, 2020, they won't be getting married until next year due to the effects of COVID-19.
And Lauren married country singer Chris Lane in October 2019 and is currently living in Nashville with him.
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