‘The Bachelor’: Gabi Says She Stayed On Show To Protect Kaity From Feeling Like Zach’s ‘Default’

In her first interview after ‘The Bachelor’, Gabi Elnicki opened up about why she didn’t self-eliminate from the show when she first realized Zach Shallcross wasn’t picking her.

Gabi Elnicki was eliminated by Zach Shallcross on the final rose ceremony of The Bachelor, but before she even got to that point, she mentioned multiple times that she “knew” she wasn’t going to be picked. This has led to some questions about why Gabi didn’t just self-eliminate and send herself home, which she opened up about on the March 30 episode of the Click Bait With Bachelor Nation podcast. Gabi explained that her decision to stay was for the sake of her close friend, Kaity Biggar, who Zach wound up proposing to in the end.

“It was clear that Kaity was the choice. Kaity had been the choice,” Gabi told host Joe Amabile. “But if I had left, she could’ve felt like she was the choice by default. She WAS truly the choice and I never wanted her to feel like, ‘Well, Gabi left so he had to choose me.’ No, he was always choosing Kaity. The only reason I would’ve left is because I knew that. But I didn’t want her to feel any kind of doubt when he proposed to her and she watched it all back.”

Gabi and Kaity formed a close friendship throughout the season. Even though Gabi went through many ups and downs with Zach, she’s still excited for him and Kaity, and said she even plans to attend their future wedding. “I’m happy for [Zach] and Kaity,” she insisted. ‘Truly, from the bottom of my heart, I want nothing but the best for them. I told Zach and his family, ‘You’re not getting rid of me, because I’m friends with Kaity, so even if it’s not me, I’m going to be around!’ If I’m not invited to the wedding…Kaity and I have beef! I don’t think she’d ever do that to me.”

Gabi said she first started feeling like she wasn’t going to be Zach’s choice at the fantasy suite rose ceremony. It was a tough week for everyone involved, beginning with Zach declaring that he did not want to have sex during his overnight dates. He and Gabi did end up sleeping together, and afterward, he told her that he wanted to be honest and tell the other women about it (he did proceed to tell Kaity about what happened). At the rose ceremony, Zach admitted to feeling like a “failure” because of how everything went down.

“In that rose ceremony, he was only speaking to Kaity and he wasn’t making eye contact with me,” Gabi explained. “It was a really isolating feeling. In that moment, I knew it was not me. Anyone who loved me and wanted it to be me wouldn’t speak of something that was a special moment in that way. I understand he was speaking about his parameters and the mistake he made by setting the parameter, but there was a level of…these words are really mean. So I just knew it was not me.”

Gabi also defended Kaity for a moment between them that was caught on camera after that rose ceremony. Kaity was heard whispering to Gabi, “I know you were the only one,” which received backlash from many viewers who thought she was putting Gabi on blast. However, Kaity told HollywoodLife EXCLUSIVELY that there was “no malicious intent” behind the comment, which Gabi reiterated in her podcast interview. “Honestly, maybe she was trying to reassure me, like, ‘It was only you!'” Gabi said. “But I don’t know what happened in their fantasy suite.  That’s for them. But we are very close friends. I don’t think she was trying to hurt me or call me out or make me uncomfortable. That was not the case. You know you’re always being recorded, but I don’t think we thought that us speaking behind our roses was going to make it on air!”

While filming all of this was hard enough for Gabi, it was even more difficult to watch back over the past two weeks. On After the Final Rose, Gabi revealed that she had no idea how much Zach had shared about their time together on-camera. “I was not aware of the conversation that was being had with Jesse [Palmer] and in his interviews,” Gabi explained on Click Bait. “He was using my name, he was speaking — what, I think, is in detail — about what happened. That caught me very off-guard watching it back. I knew Kaity knew because of what we talked about after the roses were given out, but watching it back, I didn’t realize how much had been revealed.”

She explained that she didn’t mind if Kaity knew what was going on, but said she felt like there “could have been some discretion when speaking about it” on-camera. Gabi also said she was “disappointed” when she found out that Zach had never told the other woman involved, Ariel Frenkel, about what had happened. “She was standing in that rose ceremony just as confused as I was,” Gabi admitted.

Gabi was able to express most of this to Zach on After the Final Rose, but in her new interview, she reiterated the point that she wasn’t sure she was able to get across: “I didn’t know the extent to which [Zach] disclosed this information about me.” She added, “I wanted him to know how violating that feels. I wish he would’ve sent me home. I didn’t get to say that to him, but I do wish he just sent me home when he felt like he knew [it wasn’t me]. I also don’t want to accuse him of lying about how he was feeling. For him to say [to me], ‘I didn’t know until [the night before the final rose ceremony],’ and then I watch the next part and hear him say to Kaity, ‘I knew it was you but I had to keep going because of the show,’ it’s conflicting views. I’m literally a person with feelings and a heart and that honestly hurt me more, watching it back.”