Colton Underwood Admits Hooking Up With Married Men Before ‘Virgin Bachelor’ Fame
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Former NFL player and “Bachelor” star Colton Underwood admitted that he hooked up with married straight men while he was still in the closet, prior to his time on the reality franchise.
“To protect myself, I would only hook up with married men. [Married] ‘straight’ men,” Underwood said during a Tuesday appearance on the “We Need To Talk” podcast. “So that was sort of my rule that I would never break. When I was in the closet, that would be the only time I would ever hook up with men was if they were married … because they had more to lose than I did.”
The reality star explained that he was terrified of being outed as gay and saw the arrangement as a form of self-preservation.
“I was very careful, even when I was physically experimenting with guys and trying to, like, figure myself out,” he said. “So if they tried to, you know, ruin my career and my life for football, they had a whole family that they’d be risking as well. So it’s a messed up thing to think through, but like it was a form of self-preservation … it was just like a way to protect myself.”
Underwood joined “Bachelor Nation” on Becca Kufrin’s season of “The Bachelorette” before starring as the lead on “The Bachelor” in 2019. During promotion for his season, he was marketed as the first “Virgin Bachelor,” a label he said he disliked because it drew unwanted scrutiny at a time when he had already hooked up with men.
“I remember I always got asked why I was a virgin. So that was the storyline that they wanted to run with, and I hated it ’cause I didn’t want that pressure, and then I also didn’t want people digging in because at that time I had hooked up with men,” he said.
Underwood added that he told producers he was a virgin on the first night of “The Bachelorette,” which helped shape his entire storyline on the show. He said he accepted the “Bachelor” role in part because he believed it would force him to live publicly as straight, aligning with expectations from his faith and family.
“What I was telling myself is, ‘this is going to force me [to be straight],’” he recalled. “I’m going to be so publicly straight that I will never be able to be gay again.”
In a 2021 interview with Variety, Underwood had previously acknowledged hooking up with married men but clarified that it did not involve sex.
Underwood came out as gay in April 2021. He married Jordan C. Brown in March 2023, and the couple welcomed their first child via surrogate in 2024.
“To protect myself, I would only hook up with married men. [Married] ‘straight’ men,” Underwood said during a Tuesday appearance on the “We Need To Talk” podcast. “So that was sort of my rule that I would never break. When I was in the closet, that would be the only time I would ever hook up with men was if they were married … because they had more to lose than I did.”
The reality star explained that he was terrified of being outed as gay and saw the arrangement as a form of self-preservation.
“I was very careful, even when I was physically experimenting with guys and trying to, like, figure myself out,” he said. “So if they tried to, you know, ruin my career and my life for football, they had a whole family that they’d be risking as well. So it’s a messed up thing to think through, but like it was a form of self-preservation … it was just like a way to protect myself.”
Underwood joined “Bachelor Nation” on Becca Kufrin’s season of “The Bachelorette” before starring as the lead on “The Bachelor” in 2019. During promotion for his season, he was marketed as the first “Virgin Bachelor,” a label he said he disliked because it drew unwanted scrutiny at a time when he had already hooked up with men.
“I remember I always got asked why I was a virgin. So that was the storyline that they wanted to run with, and I hated it ’cause I didn’t want that pressure, and then I also didn’t want people digging in because at that time I had hooked up with men,” he said.
Underwood added that he told producers he was a virgin on the first night of “The Bachelorette,” which helped shape his entire storyline on the show. He said he accepted the “Bachelor” role in part because he believed it would force him to live publicly as straight, aligning with expectations from his faith and family.
“What I was telling myself is, ‘this is going to force me [to be straight],’” he recalled. “I’m going to be so publicly straight that I will never be able to be gay again.”
In a 2021 interview with Variety, Underwood had previously acknowledged hooking up with married men but clarified that it did not involve sex.
Underwood came out as gay in April 2021. He married Jordan C. Brown in March 2023, and the couple welcomed their first child via surrogate in 2024.
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