Golden Bachelor alum Theresa Nist broke her silence on ex-husband Gerry Turner’s cancer battle hours after the reality star shared his diagnosis.
“That’s devastating news, really. I was extremely upset,” Theresa, 71, told People in an interview published on Wednesday, December 11, adding that Gerry, 72, broke the news to her “when [she] visited Gerry in Indiana [some time in March].”
She added, “He’s a very positive person and I am too, and I know that he will do the best that he can to make this a positive experience. And I have every faith that is going to work out that way, that it’s going to be the type of cancer that will not affect his life and that he’ll live to be a very healthy old age.”
The New Jersey native’s comments come just hours after news broke of Gerry’s cancer diagnosis, which he claimed played a role in his decision to divorce Theresa.
“As Theresa and I were trying very hard to find our lifestyle and where we were going to live and how we were going to make our life work, I was unfortunately diagnosed with cancer,” he told People. “I wanted my life to continue on as normal as possible, and that led me to believing that as normal as possible more meant spending time with my family, my two daughters, my two sons-in-law, my granddaughter. And the importance of finding the way with Theresa was still there, but it became less of a priority.”
According to Gerry, Theresa was “a little bit awestruck by the news.”
“When you are hit with that kind of news and the shock wears off after a few days or a few weeks and you regroup and you realize what’s important to you, that’s where you start to move forward,” he added.
Gerry was diagnosed with Waldenström’s macroglobulinemia, which the Mayo Clinic says is a “type of cancer that begins in the white blood cells” and “is considered a type of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. It’s sometimes called lymphoplasmacytic lymphoma.”
While the former restaurateur said “there’s no cure for” for his form of cancer, Theresa claimed, “He told me though, that it was the type of cancer that he would most likely outlive.”
Theresa and Gerry tied the knot on January 4 in a televised ceremony after getting engaged during the season 1 finale of The Golden Bachelor. She later explained that their rush down the aisle was largely due to a “a time constraint on the offer” for a lavish wedding. The couple called it quits just three months later, claiming their indecision on where to live as newlyweds led to their split.
“We’ve kind of come to the conclusion mutually that it’s probably time for us to dissolve our marriage. The thing that strikes me the most and in our conversations, it’s been how dedicated both of us are to our families,” Gerry said during an appearance on Good Morning America. “So, we look at these situations and I think we just feel like it’s best for the happiness of each of us to live apart.”
