Golden Bachelor Gerry Turner and his fiancée, Theresa Nist, tied the knot in a televised wedding on Thursday, January 4, one month after their finale aired.
“I love your heart, your soul. I love your smiles, your laughter. We have so much fun together. We laugh until we cry,” Theresa said during her vows. “We have that same, deep love of family. We have so much love to share and now so many more people to share it with. I promise to be your calm in a storm, to comfort you when you’re sad, laugh with you when you’re happy, and to stick with you throughout it all, but most of all, to have fun and to enjoy for the rest of the time we have left on this Earth, which could be another hour. I love you with all of my heart and I cannot wait to be your wife.”
Gerry echoed her love with sentimental words of his own.
“I have learned that you are the woman I can’t live without. I learned that you make me calm with the touch of your hand. I’ve learned you make me laugh with the easy comfort of a long-lost friend,” he said during his vows. “I’ve learned you are a strong and independent woman, and your strength gives me joy. I’ve learned that you make me a better person, a better man because of your sensitivity and soft voice. Theresa, I now know I have found a full partner to share the experiences life will throw at us.”
There was more than 50 Bachelor Nation guests in attendance in Palm Springs on Thursday, including Trista and Ryan Sutter, Jason and Molly Mesnick, Desiree and Chris Siegfried, Raven Gates and Adam Gottschalk, Jade Roper and Tanner Tolbert, Kenny Braasch and Mari Pepin, Kaitlyn Bristowe, Tayshia Adams, Charity Lawson and current Bachelor Joey Graziadei.
Gerry, 72, and Theresa, 70, met and fell in love during season 1 of The Golden Bachelor. The couple got engaged during the November 2023 finale and announced at the live After the Final Rose special that they would exchange vows on TV in January 2024.
“We’re old! Think about it this way: You can wait a year in your 20s because that might be 3 percent of your remaining life,” Gerry said on the “Bachelor Happy Hour” podcast in November 2023 of his and Theresa’s decision to wed sooner rather than later. “When you’re in your 70s, a year could be 10 percent or 20 percent of the time you have left.”
Prior to his proposal airing, Gerry confessed that he was hesitant to remarry after the 2017 death of his first wife, Toni.
“As I was dating [before the show], I was looking for the person that I would spend the rest of my life with regardless of the label,” he exclusively told Us Weekly in October 2023. “And as I got closer and closer to the process started in the show, I really kind of came to realize that I did indeed want to be married, that I wanted that commitment, that two-way street. And so as I got into the show, that was my objective.”
Once Gerry and Theresa’s engagement was public knowledge, they opened up about planning their nuptials.
“We have daughters who are so involved,” Theresa explained to People in December 2023. “My daughter, she’s seen a million weddings and she is incredible. She’s put together the vision board. She’s asking me, ‘Do you like this? Do you like this?’ And I go, ‘Wow, OK, I don’t even have to do this. This is awesome.’ She’s handling it pretty much.”
Gerry, for his part, was eager to give Theresa complete control over their big day.
“I can just hear the joy in her voice when I talk to her and she’s talking about whether it’s a dress or a cake or flowers or whatever it is,” he gushed. “It makes me so happy that she’s having this much of a good time with it. It’s like, what could be more fun?”
As for their future together, Theresa detailed what the pair were looking forward to the most.
“I would say finding a home together and creating that home that everyone would want to come to — our entire family, our friends — and just exploring life together and having adventures, going on vacation together and having a fun, incredible, wonderful life,” she said. “We feel like we’re going to have the best lives together.”
That includes merging their respective families. Gerry is the father of daughters Jenny Young and Angie Turner, while Theresa has a son, Tommy Nist, and a daughter, Jen Woolston. In December 2023, Gerry shared a photo of their adult children via Instagram with the caption, “Going to be a very Gerry Christmas with Theresa and our blended family.”
