Chris Bukowski is officially retiring from reality TV. The guy who’s been on every Bachelor franchise series except The Bachelor recently shared his “retirement letter,” which revealed his obsession with fame, his demons and a public apology.
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“I’m 28 years old. I’ve been on five The Bachelor-related TV shows and it’s finally time to hang up the roses. I’ll be honest. I won’t hold anything back. I became obsessed with being on TV. That might not seem normal to some, but for me — in the moment — I always convinced myself I needed to go back,” Bukowski wrote on RantNOW.
Bukowski made his TV debut on The Bachelorette season 8, where he competed for Emily Maynard and ended up in fourth place. He then joined Bachelor Pad season 3, where he was perceived as a villain.
“My first go-around on The Bachelorette was an amazing experience because I had no expectations… After being a likable character on The Bachelorette I was thrown into the lions den of Bachelor Pad. My competitiveness got the best of me and with that came some serious consequences. I will NEVER forget the feeling I had when I woke up in the Bachelor mansion knowing every single person in that house hated me. I’d never felt that before and honestly, I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to leave but quitting is not in my vocabulary.” he revealed.
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“Bachelor Pad was the pinnacle of my Bachelor career to say the least,” Bukowski continued. “It almost completely ruined me, my family and my career. As I mentioned before, I couldn’t believe the hate towards me. The tweets, the Facebook messages, the media, etc. — I couldn’t handle it. I’ll never forget going to my parents’ house and witnessing my dad obsess over all of the stuff being said about me. That show ruined my relationship with my father at the time and created distance between me and my mother.”
In 2014, he crashed the first night of the competition of The Bachelorette season 10 but was rejected by Andi Dorfman and escorted out by security. In the same year, he joined the first season of Bachelor in Paradise. He decided to quit the show due to a knee injury but not before asking Elise Mosca to leave along with him so they could continue to pursue their relationship back home. Their romance, however, was short-lived.
“I liked Andi and truly felt there could be something there,” he wrote. “I reached out to a few producers and was told that it was too late. Well, that obviously didn’t stop me — or them — from creating the fiasco that was night one of Andi’s season of The Bachelorette. If for one second you thought I pulled that whole night off on my own, you’re absolutely insane… I sincerely apologize to Andi and the gentlemen there.”
“At this point of my career, I had officially become the biggest joke on reality TV. Attempting to fix my reputation had ultimately made it worse. My obsession with television had completely taken over my life… I was on the brink of giving up. I struggled daily. Literally, every single day,” he said.
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Eager to find a date to his sister’s wedding, Bukowski then joined Bachelor in Paradise season 2 but quit on the same night of his arrival.
“What you saw is me at my absolute weakest moment, masking everything in my head behind ounces of alcohol,” Bukowski admitted. “I returned to Bachelor in Paradise in hopes of finding a date to my sister’s wedding. I left without a single memory of my time there. That’s why I didn’t watch that episode, as much as I would have liked to. I don’t remember being there and I don’t want to watch the version of me on TV.”
Now Bukowski seems to be in a better place.
“I can’t fix my mistakes but I can learn from them. I’ve now learned it’s time to let go.
I won’t miss it. I can’t wait for my television career to be over. I miss being me,” he said.
(Image courtesy of ABC)
Staff Writer, BuddyTV
