As Bachelor Nation continues to reel over Rachael Kirkconnell’s “Call Her Daddy” appearance, Us Weekly went into the archives to give more context about comments she made regarding her first breakup from Matt James.
Kirkconnell, 28, and James, 33, briefly split in 2021 as their season of The Bachelor was airing. At the time, Kirkconnell was under fire for past photos at an Old South-themed college party. After then-host Chris Harrison asked fans to give “grace” to Kirkconnell that February, the backlash got even worse and James ended things.
“He felt so much pressure to just make the right decision and to stand by what was right for him at the time. And, you know, strangers and people that were really close to him in his life were saying, like, ‘I don’t think you should be with her,’” Kirkconnell recalled to Alex Cooper on the Tuesday, January 28, podcast episode. “And so I think at the time, he thought that was the right decision, just to take a step back and not be together. … I was definitely shocked when [he] broke up with me, only because we were very happy together, even with all of the chaos around us when it was just me and him behind closed doors, it was amazing. It was so much fun. We were so happy when we decided to not let the outside noise get to us.”
The twosome confirmed their initial breakup during After the Final Rose that March. Not long after that, Kirkconnell and James were spotted together in New York City, sparking reunion reconciliation. A woman named Grace subsequently came forward to Bachelor blogger Reality Steve to reveal that she had been casually seeing James.
Rachael Kirkconnell Details Matt James Split on Call Her Daddy: Revelations
“It just didn’t sit right with me,” Grace, who claimed she met James for the first time with Tyler Cameron in Florida in 2020, told Reality Steve at the time. “I just felt like Rachael was so in love with him and for him to be trying to contact me and hang out with me — someone he’s had past romantic relationships with — two days prior in Miami … I felt like I had to say something for Rachael’s sake.”
Us reported at the time that Kirkconnell felt “manipulated” by James. “Rachael is very emotional right now because she was very hopeful that things were going to work out. She’s still trying to process this,” the source said.
Kirkconnell spoke about the situation for the first time during her interview with Cooper.
Rachael Kirkconnell Reveals Why Matt James Ended Their Relationship
“I was very, very, very upset when I found everything out, and I just remember telling him that he lied to me,” she said, reiterating that she still felt betrayed even though she and Matt were broken up. “I just remember storming out of his place, and I was like, ‘Don’t ever talk to me again, like, we’re done,’ because I just found out a lot of stuff all at once. I just was definitely a little bamboozled.”
After the dust settled, Kirkconnell and James were able to work things out when he took a work trip to her native Georgia. The pair were back together in late spring 2021, but the trust issues from the situation with Grace remained.
“I felt like I had a hard time trusting him because of what was happening when we were apart, and that girl coming through, obviously, and everything, I was just asking myself, like, ‘Are you still doing this?’ But I know to this day … he’s not a cheater, you know?” she explained to Cooper. “I never actually had to worry about him cheating on me, because technically, if he was ever with other women, we were apart. So I can’t, you know, call him a cheater, or worry about him cheating on me.”
After four years together, James ultimately pulled the plug on their relationship earlier this month. Kirkconnell said that he broke up with her in Tokyo after tension over where to have dinner boiled over into him questioning if she had the qualities he wanted in a wife.
Matt James and Rachael Kirkconnell’s Split: What Went Wrong?
“I was bothering him. I was annoying him. … [He] kind of snapped at me to where I got mad at him because I was like, ‘You know, even if I’m annoying you, like, don’t treat me like that.’ And so then it seemed like we were both kind of mad at each other or annoyed with each other,” Kirkconnell recalled. “He said that at the end of the day there were just qualities about me that he worries about having in a wife. … There are things that we aren’t compatible with and the whole accountability and saying sorry and all that was really the main thing. It was just one of those things where he, I think, just had this realization that ‘I should want to propose to you by this time. Like, at this point in our relationship, I should be wanting those things and I should be ready for that. But I’m not still, I still don’t feel like we’re ready or I don’t feel like I’m ready. I don’t know if I ever see myself proposing to you. I can’t actually see myself married to you.’”
