Over the past five days, we've reviewed the first five seasons of
The Bachelor, but it's time to give the guys a break. This weekend, we'll take a look back at the women of
The Bachelorette, starting with the very first one,
Trista Rehn, now Trista Sutter.
Trista, a physical therapist and dancer for the Miami Heat, first appeared on the first season of
The Bachelor, where she was one of the final two women angling for the final rose from Alex Michel.
Things didn't work out with him, but it turned out that not getting the rose from Alex might just have been one of the best things that ever happened to her.
Your Take
sunny said:
I'm glad to see that they're still together and happy, but would you really want your kids to watch the sea...
She might not have been Alex's pick, but the audience found her likable and wanted to see her find love, so the producers brought her back for the very first season of
The Bachelorette. Like the men of
The Bachelor, she also had 25 prospects (including
Bob Guiney, future Season 4 Bachelor) to consider when handing out her roses, and she got to know them through her own cycle of group dates and private time.
Trista worked her way to the final two, Charlie Maher, an Account Executive from California, and Ryan Sutter, a poetry-writing firefighter from Colorado. Although she felt a strong connection with Charlie, ultimately, she wrote in her ABC diary about the show, “comparing him to Ryan and the feelings that I have for Ryan, there is no comparison.”
So why Ryan? She also wrote, “When I think about Ryan and I together it's like we are two pieces of the perfect puzzle. He makes me a better person and I think that I inspire the same in him. I'm kind of the extroverted crazy woman who is very social and outgoing, and he's kind of a more gentle nurturing soul who can kind of balance me and calm me down when I am with him.”
In the final rose ceremony, Ryan proposed, and the two were married later that year. The couple that fell in love on television shared the wedding with the public – and made a cool million in the process. It was a good investment for ABC, however. The ceremony finale of the three-episode special
Trista and Ryan's Wedding was watched by over 26 million viewers, one of the largest audiences ever for a reality program.
Since the wedding, the two have settled in Colorado. The couple starred together in a
Honeymoon Hotspots program, and both have also made appearances on talk shows. She also appeared on Fear Factor and was the first celebrity voted off the first season of
Dancing with the Stars.
This year, though, brought them something the two have been waiting for, their first child. On July 26 of this year, their son, Maxwell Alston Sutter was born. While there were complications that led to his early arrival, he is now healthy enough that Trista and Ryan have shared photos of him in issues of US Magazine appearing on newsstands right now.
Years earlier, Trista imagined this family when writing in her diary about
The Bachelorette. After the final rose ceremony, she wrote, “I don't think that I could have imagined a better ending to this fairy tale story. My kids are going to know that mommy and daddy met on a television show, and even though it sounds crazy, it was meant to be. It was our destiny and we have it all on tape.”
Head back here tomorrow for our Rewind of Season 2 of
The Bachelorette
'The Bachelor' Rewind, Season 1
- Leslie Seaton, BuddyTV Staff Columnist
Sources: Us Weekly, Celebrity Baby Blog, ABC.com, TV.com
Images courtesy of Us Weekly, Celebrity Baby Blog and ABC)