The Bachelorette co-host Kaitlyn Bristowe has revealed that Michelle Young was absolutely in love with both Nayte Olukoya and Brandon Jones and her final decision was gut-wrenching.
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On The Bachelorette's eighteenth season, Michelle is about to introduce Nayte and Brandon to her parents and enjoy final dates with them. She is only days away from the Final Rose Ceremony, when she must choose a winner and potentially accept a marriage proposal.
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Kaitlyn shared how Michelle was completely torn between her Final 2 bachelors at the end of The Bachelorette process during a recent interview on Us Weekly's "Here for the Right Reasons" podcast.
"Back in the day on these shows, we used to be, like, 'I can't believe they're in love with more than one person and they said it,'" Kaitlyn, 36, noted.
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"Michelle is just -- she is so strong in who she is, and she's like, 'No, if I'm in love with two people, I'm in love with two. I didn't think it would happen, but it did.'"
The Season 11 The Bachelorette star, who co-hosted Season 18 of the ABC reality dating series with Tayshia Adams, added, "I think it's gonna be really hard for her no matter what the outcome because she genuinely is in love with two people."
The Bachelorette finale is set to air as a three-hour event, with a two-hour episode followed by the After the Final Rose special, on Tuesday, December 21 at 8PM ET/PT on ABC.
"[The finale is] gonna be all of the things -- it's gonna be emotional, it's gonna be hard to watch, it's gonna be beautiful, it's gonna be sad," Kaitlyn teased.
"It's all the things that you'd want to see in a finale. But I mean, she really, genuinely is in love with two people."
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Kaitlyn then broke down her thoughts on Michelle's finalists, who are also both "in love" with Michelle and want to be her future husband.
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On Brandon, a 26-year-old traveling nurse recruiter from Portland, OR, Kaitlyn shared, "Brandon is just such a sweetheart who wears his heart on his sleeve."
Kaitlyn apparently believes that when Brandon pulled Michelle aside for a private chat right before the post-Fantasy Suites Rose Ceremony was about to commence, his intentions were pure and he wasn't trying to secure a Final 2 rose.
"He is so open with his emotions that I think he genuinely wanted to tell her like, 'It's okay if it's not me,'" Kaitlyn told Us.
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Brandon recently wrote on Instagram that his goal was to comfort Michelle during a difficult time and make sure that she was in a good state of mind and well-being before breaking up with a man she really cared about.
"He was putting her first and worried about her stressing out," Kaitlyn recalled of Brandon.
"And I think when you walk into that moment and you're looking at those Final 3 men, I'm sure you know who it is that it might not make a difference in that moment. Now it might, but I don't think it did in that moment."
As for Nayte, a 27-year-old Canadian sales executive currently living in Austin, TX, Kaitlyn called him "a funny character."
"He really is so chill and laid back. And I think Nayte just really is confident in his relationship with Michelle and where they're at, at this point," Kaitlyn explained.
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Kaitlyn said Nayte's confidence was "different" from the other men because he could "compartmentalize" his relationship vs. Michelle's other connections on the show.
"And it's so interesting because we watch the show and... you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't," the former Dancing with the Stars winner noted.
"Because if you can't handle Michelle going in the Fantasy Suite with the other people, then people at home are going, 'Well, you knew what you signed up for and you know what show you're on.' And then if you sit there and you can compartmentalize and say, 'Yeah, I know what show I'm on and I'm gonna be confident in my relationship and I'm not gonna get in my own head about it,' well then you're cocky and you might not care enough."
She added, "So I think he is just has a different confidence about him and knows where he's at with Michelle."
During Michelle's round of overnight Fantasy Suite dates, she told Nayte that she was "in love" with him, but she only appeared to tell Brandon that she had been "falling" for him.
While Brandon definitely appeared ready for an engagement at this stage in the game, many The Bachelorette viewers are skeptical whether Nayte -- who had never been in love or brought a woman home to meet his parents before -- was truly prepared to pop the question.
Even Nayte's stepfather Charles voiced during Nayte's hometown date that the 6'8" suitor probably wouldn't be ready to propose marriage to Michelle in just a couple weeks of filming.
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But Kaitlyn, who had a front row seat to Michelle's season, insisted, "I think Nayte never in his life thought about being ready for an engagement until now. And I just think Nayte [is] the kind of person that if he isn't ready, he's not going to propose."
During The Bachelorette's latest episode, Michelle sent early frontrunner Joe Coleman packing, and her decision "shocked" Joe as well as many fans watching her love story unfold on TV.
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"But again, she just had such strong relationships with all three men that I would've been shocked no matter who went," Kaitlyn reasoned.
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