November 10, 2022 • bachelor insider
Eliza Reveals the Real Reason Why She Picked Rodney at the Rose Ceremony Over Justin
Sharing her side of the story.
Bachelor Nation fans first met Eliza on Season 26 of “The Bachelor,” and she’s returned to our screens for Season 8 of “Bachelor in Paradise.”
Over the past couple of weeks, Eliza was at the center of one of the most heartbreaking love triangles in Bachelor Nation history involving herself, Justin, and Rodney.
Now, Eliza is stopping by the “Click Bait with Bachelor Nation” podcast to open up about why she chose Rodney at this week’s Rose Ceremony and then changed her mind to go after Justin.
“Click Bait” co-host Joe Amabile started off by giving Eliza some grace given the high-pressure environment in “Paradise.”
He said, “I get it. There is a lot of pressure. People absolutely love Rodney and what people don’t know is that during the Rose Ceremony, guys and girls get split up. I’m assuming you had a lot of people in your ear saying how great Rodney is. But can you walk us through your decision?”
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Eliza agreed that there was a lot of pressure on her, saying, “That Rose Ceremony and the two days leading up to it were the absolute worst. I was going through it. I was so distraught. It got to the point where I was telling the girls and producers that I can’t do this and I’d rather just take the L and just leave.”
She went on, saying, “It was killing me. There was so much pressure because either way at the end of this I was going to hurt somebody. To my core, I just couldn’t do it. They are both great guys and that’s what made it so much harder.”
Eliza shared that she didn’t know what her decision was going to be even in the moments leading up to the Rose Ceremony.
She shared, “We got up to the Rose Ceremony night and I feel like I held up the whole ceremony for an hour because I was in the background crying. Up until the very last minute, I still didn’t know what was going to come out of my mouth. I chose Rodney because from the beginning, I did want it to be him. In the back of my head, I did want it to be Rodney. I had spent more time with him and I felt a sense of loyalty to him.”
Eliza continued on, explaining, “It’s not like our relationship was bad. We were having an amazing time. I just felt like what happened the few days before and going on that date with Justin just set us back. In the end, I ultimately still wanted it to be him. So that’s why I got up there and said his name, I still cared for him.”
But ultimately she didn’t feel like she had enough time to make such a high-pressure decision.
Eliza said, “There were also so many people telling me that Rodney was the right choice for me and I was trying to process, but it was all happening within the span of a couple hours. You don’t have time in ‘Paradise’ to really process your feelings and figure out what you really want because everything is just happening from one second to the next.”
And co-host Natasha Parker asked Eliza if she would’ve done the same thing and gone back to Rodney if she had picked Justin at that Rose Ceremony.
Eliza said, “Yeah, that’s a good point. Yes, and I think honestly, that’s a good reflection of how I was feeling. Either way, I was going to go back and forth because I didn’t feel like I had enough time to figure out what I really wanted. Either way, I would’ve thought I made the wrong decision. I was just choosing things because of pressure. I had no time to figure out how I was feeling. I don’t think I even spent a full two weeks at that beach.”
To hear more of Eliza’s conversation on the “Click Bait with Bachelor Nation” podcast, check out the full episode below.