The Bachelor's Clare was a changed person on tonight's After the Final Rose, and we're so glad. She caught a lot of flack throughout the show for not ditching Juan Pablo way back after he slut-shamed her for mutually agreeing to go night-swimming with him. He was pretty awful to her and though she tried to argue with him a little bit, he eventually managed to talk his way out of the situation. Which disappointed a lot of fans who wished she'd stood up for herself more.
And then again tonight Clare's red flag went up when Juan Pablo made an offensive sexual comment to her. She tried to explain how it made her feel, but to everyone's dismay, (and I mean everyone, even Sean Lowe was shaking his head at her) he again twisted his way out of taking any blame. Throughout the show, Clare seemed to take way too much of JP's crap while other girls like Sharleen and Andi chose to leave.
But finally, after Juan Pablo essentially dumped her, Clare fought back a little bit. She rejected his attempt to get more besitos and let him know that he was not the man she thought he was. "I would never want my children having a father like you,” she said as she walked away. Bam, that's the Clare we wanted to see, it's just too bad she didn't pull it out until the last moment.
But fortunately those episodes were filmed a long time ago and the Clare on the show who was all too easily manipulated by JP's confusing sentences is not the same woman as she is today. On tonight's After the Final Rose special, Clare looked confident, self-assured, and even happy. Good for her! She asserted herself further letting Chris Harrison know that she was not going to waste her time talking to Juan Pablo when there wasn't anything to say. "I don't want to get fed anymore BS," she says as the crowd cheered her on. "Plain and simple he's not the man I thought he was."
Clare's transformation from succumbing to Juan Pablo's words to not even wanting to hear them is inspiring and Bachelor Nation felt that way too. Clare's come a long way, and her renaissance was just what we wanted to see.
Image: ABC
