Getting vulnerable.

Bachelor Nation fans first met Abigail Heringer on Season 25 of “The Bachelor,” and she went on to find love with Noah Erb on Season 7 of “Bachelor in Paradise.”

During her time on the Bachelor Nation shows, Abigail opened up about her hearing loss and how she wears a cochlear implant.

Since her time on the shows, Abigail has been sharing her life with Bachelor Nation on social media, including many posts about being deaf, where she educates her hundreds of thousands of followers.

As a part of her “Hear Me Out” series, Abi opened up about her experience dating with a disability before we got to know her on the Bachelor Nation shows.

Abigail took to TikTok and said, “I want to get a little more personal and talk about if I’ve ever gotten a negative reaction from a guy when I told them that I was deaf. Ironically, the first time that you guys saw me meet a guy, two times in a row actually, I had a great experience talking to them about my deafness. But that definitely was not always the case.”

The Bachelor Nation star shared more about her pre-“Bachelor” dating experience.

She said, “I’ve never had someone be like, ‘I can’t go on a date with you because you’re deaf’ or ‘I don’t like you because you have cochlear implants,’ but it is definitely harder to date when you’re deaf. A lot of first dates are at super noisy places, so I ended up missing about 50% of the conversation.”

Abigail went on, saying, “I also didn’t tell the majority of the guys that I was deaf, so in hindsight, that definitely hurt me more than anything. Since I didn’t I could literally see the moment and the switch happening in their face of it going from a good date to them giving up and marking it off that we weren’t compatible since I couldn’t engage in the conversation as much as I wanted to.”

Abigail shared that she learned over time that being confident about who you are and your disability will help you find the kind of partner you’re looking for.

She said, “It wasn’t their fault because they didn’t even know I was deaf, but what I’ve learned is that the more open and confident that you are about your deafness, you will attract the people that want to learn more, ask questions, and ultimately support you. Those are the traits of a good partner at the end of the day.”