Former ‘Bachelor’ contestant comes out as gay in GMA interview

Colton Underwood, a star of “The Bachelor”in 2019, came out as gay Wednesday morning during an interview on “Good Morning America.”

“I’ve ran from myself fora long time. I’ve hated myself for a long time,” Underwood told GMA co-anchor Robin Roberts. “I’m gay, and I came to terms with that earlier this year and have been processing it. And the next step in all of this was sort of letting people know. Still nervous but, yeah, it’s been a journey for sure.”

Underwood, 29, is a former football player who first appeared on ABC’S long-running reality franchise as a contestant on Becca Kufrin’s season of “The Bachelorette” in 2018, and followed it up with a stint on “Bachelor in Paradise.”

Last year, Underwood published a book titled “The First Time” and wrote about how he questioned his sexuality as a teenager. Rumors circulated around school that he was gay, and he said he eventually started to believe it.“i thought, maybe I am gay. The captain of the football team should be having sex and drinking, right? But I wasn’t,” he wrote.

“In high school, when I was struggling with my sexuality, I’m not going to talk to my parents about it. So I internalized it.”

Ultimately, he decided to come out because he reached a point when he had suicidal thoughts and realized “I would have rather died than say ‘I’m gay,’ and I think that was sort of my wakeup call.”

“I was like, ‘This is your life. Take back control,’” Underwood said.

Colton Underwood