After his tumultuous breakup with Theresa Nist, Gerry Turner faced more than just heartbreak. The Golden Bachelor alum, in his recently released memoir Golden Years: What I've Learned from Love, Loss, and Reality TV, recounted his struggle with a rare form of bone marrow cancer during their divorce proceedings. To his surprise, Theresa's reaction to his diagnosis was a chilling silence.
"On April 25, two weeks after we filed for divorce, I called Theresa to share my health journey," he recounted. "Since all my close friends were already in the know, it seemed unfair that she should be in the dark about it." The 74-year-old continued, "I don't recall her response; Theresa was quiet on the phone. What I do remember is that she never called to check on me or how I was doing."
For Gerry, her silence spoke volumes. "I didn't have high expectations for Theresa or any of the other women when I shared my struggles with them, but to be so insignificant to someone I had married, albeit briefly, was incredibly painful," he explained. "We no longer speak; we have no reason to."
However, Theresa, who married Gerry in a televised wedding in January 2024 before announcing their split three months later, has a different account of their phone conversation. "He presented it to me this way: 'My doctor told me that I'm going to die of old age before this cancer will get to me,'" she shared on the November 4th episode of the Dear Shandy podcast. "He made it sound like it was nothing." The 72-year-old added, "So it wasn't as dire as he's making it out to be."
Moreover, Theresa denied many of Gerry's allegations in his book, including his claim that she forced him to sleep on the couch shortly after their nuptials. "He made that up," she argued, alleging that Gerry volunteered to sleep elsewhere as she adjusted to their new sleeping arrangements. "Did he just want to make it more dramatic?"
