Before Bachelor Nation met Tayshia Adams, she was married to her college sweetheart, Josh Bourelle.
“I actually married my first boyfriend, and I was with him for about six years or so. I guess I could, kind of, sense we weren’t doing very well,” Adams told Colton Underwood on season 23 of The Bachelor, which aired in 2019. “And I think that’s why I fought so hard just to try to do as much as I possibly could [to save the marriage].”
Bourelle filed for divorce from Adams in October 2017, kess than two years after their February 2016 wedding. The roofer cited irreconcilable differences. In their divorce documents, Bourelle claimed that the pair had been “living separate lives” since August 21, 2017.
“The date of separation is 1 year and 6 months from the date of their marriage,” the docs state. “They are now agreed and intend to live apart permanently.”
After a stint on Underwood’s season, Adams went on to appear on season 6 of Bachelor in Paradise. While she had connections with Derek Peth and John Paul Jones, Adams was single by October 2019 when she and Jones called it quits for good. In August 2020, news broke that Adams was taking over for Clare Crawley on season 16 of The Bachelorette because the hairstylist fell in love with Dale Moss within the first two weeks of filming.
“It’s not hard at all [to talk about the divorce on The Bachelorette] because it’s definitely something that I’ve experienced in the past and it led me to today,” she told Us Weekly ahead of her November 2020 debut on the series. “But I don’t want it to define me because it doesn’t define me. It’s just something that I grew from and I learned from.”
Adams added that her past relationship affected her journey as the Bachelorette.
“Having been married before, I feel like … I’m not just going to do anything just to do something. I’m not going to do it because I feel like I need to or do this and that. I’m going to do it because it’s the right thing to do, and I’m excited and happy,” she told Us at the time. “If it were to happen, it’d be with the right sentiment.”
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