The Bachelor alum Caila Quinn has announced she and her fiance Nick Burrello have decided to cancel their wedding due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
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After two years of dating, Nick proposed marriage on January 2 in Sarasota FL, and Caila has presumably been planning her wedding ever since.
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But now, the wedding is off -- and Caila explained her decision in a recent blog post.
"So we just decided to cancel our weddings due to COVID-19. I have mixed emotions as I type these words with a tall glass of red wine to keep my company," Caila wrote.
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"Our original dream in January 2020 was to have a destination wedding in Italy as if we were two simple romantics running away together. But that wasn't feasible for most of our family, so we planned a second celebration locally in the Midwest to accommodate them."
"And after we were happy with our decision to have two ceremonies and tried to make our international dreams come true, on March 11th, 2020 COVID hit and had other plans," she continued.
"We held onto hope as long as we could, but with travel to Europe still prohibited 6 months out -- we had to make the tough decision to cancel. After weeks of sleepless nights and going back & forth we finally know this is the right thing to do. And we need to do the right thing."
Caila therefore clarified, "Out of concern for our loved ones' health and the unpredictability of international travel due to COVID-19, our Italy wedding had to be canceled & with that, we needed to start over stateside as well. So we actually canceled TWO WEDDINGS!"
Caila said that because she and Nick are "optimistic people," they originally gave themselves the deadline of January 2021 to decide whether to cancel their May 2021 wedding in Italy.
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Caila said they were "secretly hoping" the world would change and there would be a vaccine for COVID-19 available by then.
"I think giving yourself a deadline date is a smart way not to make a rash decision & give both partners time to come to conclusions on their own -- before deciding together," Caila shared.
Caila said her relationship "grew stronger" as she and Nick held out hope and encouraged one another as time passed.
"But a chance September catch up with a girlfriend would be the cold dose of reality I wasn't prepared for... I told her we were afraid we would have to cancel our wedding, but we would decide in January," Caila recalled.
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"My girlfriend I've known since college works in the medical field as a pediatric neurosurgeon and without hesitation, she responded with, 'Caila the world in January will look the same as it does today, so if you're going to make a decision do it now.'"
Caila said she fought that advice -- which created "a storm in my heart" -- for weeks.
"I felt lost on what to do. Then it would be a talk with my parents that would be the lightning strike to finalize our decision," Caila revealed.
This talk took place in early October when Caila was apparently very overwhelmed.
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"The second round of deposits for our Italy wedding were due at the end of the month... Nick and I had already invested thousands of dollars into both weddings, should we take the risk of investing more if international travel to Europe is still banned and not even being talked about?" Caila questioned.
Caila felt the need to bend to reality and stop fighting for her dream wedding.
"My friends and family [were] asking about booking flights while also dealing with more important life problems like being furloughed, home-schooling their kids, and health issues getting worse. They shouldn't have to worry about the financial burden of a trip when other priorities take precedence," Caila noted.
Caila said her parents heard her out and she cried many tears before finally asking her father, "Dad -- I need to know what is the right thing to do?"
Caila's father told her to cancel the wedding because booking travel abroad would be a huge risk for everyone looking to attend the wedding. Caila's dad also compared the situation to betting on a horse with a broken leg.
"And it was as if God was speaking through him directly to me. I know I don't speak about religion often, but I needed divine clarity at this moment when I felt completely torn in two," Caila said.
"Finally, I had a resolution in my heart and knew it was time to cancel. And just like that, I felt like I could breathe again. I wanted to do the 'right thing' and for the longest time couldn't see between the clouds what that was."
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Caila said Nick had arrived at the same conclusion and their decision was mutual.
"He always was more realistic about the possibility of cancelling, but he loves me so much he was going to fight for Italy as long as he could. We took the time we needed to process the big change privately," Caila explained in her blog post.
"We had late night take-out and Netflix all weekend long, before telling a single soul. You are the last person on my list to tell actually. Appreciate you being kind and sensitive to our feelings as we close this door before opening the next one and starting to plan all over again."
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Caila acknowledged while it may seem "silly" she's mourning a canceled wedding, she and Nick had invested a lot of money and time into their big day.
"We initially gave ourselves a weekend to just sit with our decision as a couple to be sure," Caila said, before sharing a list with her fans on what to do when canceling a wedding due to coronavirus.
Caila and Nick were set up by a mutual friend and went public with their relationship in October 2017 after Nick met her parents, which was well over a year after Caila appeared on Ben Higgins' season of The Bachelor.
On The Bachelor, Ben eliminated Caila right after his round of overnight Fantasy Suite dates in favor of eventual runner-up JoJo Fletcher and winner Lauren Bushnell, from whom he split in May 2017.
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Caila, who was 24-years-old at the time Ben broke up with her, was blindsided, crushed and sent home before a Rose Ceremony in Jamaica.
"I thought I'd be getting engaged in a week-and-a-half. I was ready," Caila said in tears following her ouster.
"I was ready to get married. I was ready to be his wife. I was ready. I was ready for our future. It's all I thought about. My purpose in life is to love other people and I don't know why I haven't found it yet. I thought this was it. I thought this was it. I was ready. I didn't see this coming. I love him, too. Like, I still love him."
That same year, Caila appeared on Season 3 of Bachelor in Paradise and left the show still dating Jared Haibon.
Caila even met Jared's family in Rhode Island, but she revealed during an August 2016 episode of After Paradise that "mystical forces" contributed to their split.
Jared's tight friendship with a very jealous and possessive Ashley Iaconetti seemed to be the reason behind his split with Caila about six weeks after filming wrapped.
Jared and Ashley reconciled in May 2018 after remaining friends for years and tied the knot in August 2019.
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Although Caila didn't find love on The Bachelor franchise, she told Us Weekly earlier this year her experience on reality TV placed her on a path that eventually led to meeting her future husband.
"I feel really lucky because I feel like I wasn't meant to go on the show to find love there," explained Caila, who moved from Ohio to New York after her The Bachelor stint.
"I was meant to go on the show to find Nick. If I wasn't on the show, I wouldn't ever have met him because I would never have been a blogger and that's who introduced us and set us up on our first date. So, I think everything happens for a reason and I thank God every day."
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