The Bachelor's Gina Myers learnt to love herself first after split

Gina Myers walked into The Bachelor looking for love. And she did find it - but not with Lee Thompson.

After spending eight weeks in a Johannesburg guesthouse vying for the attention of the hunky businessman, along with 23 other women, it was the Johannesburg make-up artist who stole his heart and got the final rose. However, it wasn’t a happy ending for the pair.

Just weeks after leaving the house and trying to form a relationship outside of the constructed reality that had become their daily lives, Gina told TshisaLIVE that “real life Lee was different to fairytale Lee”.

“He didn’t treat me the way a person should treat someone in a relationship. I ended things and when I walked away I said that he needs to fix himself.”

On the final episode of The Bachelor, where Lee comes face-to-face with all the women, the tense body language between the two is evident. Never making eye contact or showing any signs of affection, Gina said that it was tough to relive the experience. She said that watching a video of a romance gone wrong was something that most people don't go through.

Lee told Sunday Times that he went through a difficult emotional period after leaving the show and wasn't there for Gina when she needed him.

Even though she didn’t get her dream guy, Gina has won a bigger prize: loving herself. Describing the emotional turmoil that she has been through, learning to be gentle to herself has been her victory.

“I’ve become a different person. I am more confident in myself and my decisions. I made a decision to walk away from this, even though there was this expectation that I stay. You don’t have to buy into the fairytale. You can create your own happy ending and Lee wasn’t mine.”

No stranger to the public eye, Myers has always been well-known in the entertainment industry for being a celebrity make-up artist. It was when her best friend, Reeva Steenkamp, was murdered by paralympian Oscar Pistorius on February 14 2013 that Gina found herself in the public eye.

Ironically, the first episode of The Bachelor was aired on February 14 this year, a fact that didn’t go unnoticed.

"When I saw that the show was airing on Valentine’s Day I took it as a sign. I celebrate Reeva every single Valentine's. It’s a hard day for me. But I also recognise that that day can represent something other than what happened, and that is love.”