Kaitlyn Bristowe prefers to look on the sunny side when it comes to her love life. The former Bachelorette star revealed that she hasn't shut her heart off to the idea of love despite her two failed engagements in the past.
"I love love. I really do. I'm a sucker for it," Kaitlyn, 39, said during a guest appearance on the "I Choose Me With Jennie Garth" podcast on March 14. "I do like the idea of marriage. I do like the idea of having a family. But I don't know if anything's changed. Sometimes I think I need to soften up a little bit because I do love love, but I try to be too tough sometimes."
She continued, "I think I've always had the same beliefs and thoughts and ideas of what love is. It's just I think I've maybe gotten more secure in my own self so I can talk about it differently now."
Kaitlyn admitted that she was ultimately thankful for the "one ex who broke" her because it changed her perspective on things.
"That alone, that one breakup made me think, ‘I can get through anything," she explained. "Between losing my best friend and the guy I thought I was going to marry was like, ‘OK, I didn't think I could get through those two things,' and I came out of it more spiritual. I came out of it much stronger and, knowing myself, a million times better."
The Dancing With the Stars alum left her season of The Bachelorette engaged to Shawn Booth in 2015, but three years later they called it quits. Kaitlyn confessed that she "had a hard time with that one," but it showed her what she "deserved, and that wasn't it."
A year after her breakup with Shawn, 37, in 2018, she began dating fellow Bachelor Nation member Jason Tartick. While he proposed in 2021, they ultimately went their separate ways in 2023.
However, going forward Kaitlyn said she planned to change how she handled relationships in the future, including keeping them out of the spotlight.
"I just feel like I really would like to try a different approach this time. Although I kind of find myself feeling guilty about that, because I do share so much, and I do feel like that's part of who I am as an open book, and sharing everything, and not caring what people think," she told podcast host Jennie Garth. "But when it comes to dating right now, I just feel like I want to keep it so sacred."
Even though Kaitlyn has endured plenty of heartbreak, she said that felt like those relationships taught her some valuable lessons.
"You'd think the older you get in, the more wisdom, the more heartbreak, and the more lessons you would feel more confident going into another relationship," Kaitlyn added. "But I actually feel like I'm more confident in myself and I'm less confident and more insecure about real love. And I think that's okay because that's where I'm at right now."
