Alex and Richie's The Bachelor breakup was cloaked in secrecy. She just shared what really happened.

Alex Nation knows that what she says might divide opinion, but it's too important to stay silent.

Best known for her appearances on reality television, particularly The Bachelor Australia and Bachelor in Paradise, Alex first rose to fame in 2016 when she won the heart of Richie Strahan.

Even then, Alex was a divisive contestant. Despite being the clear front runner, many viewers were rooting for her competition: Nikki Gogan.

After winning the show, Alex and Richie announced their split just a year after their controversial finale.

The breakup was surrounded by confusion and controversy. Richie claimed he was blindsided by the split, which apparently was initiated over a text message. Then the media went into a frenzy when Alex was photographed with her new partner, Maegan Luxa, shortly after their split.

The fallout from their split played out when the two exes were (rather awkwardly) reunited on Bachelor In Paradise in 2019.

Watch an awkward moment between the exes on BIP. Post continues after video.

In an intense conversation on the show, Alex alluded to the couple agreeing to have an abortion during their relationship.

But in a new podcast interview, she shared exactly what happened.

In a chat on the Confessions of a Reality Star podcast, Alex said that she had her first abortion after she and Richie had a surprise pregnancy.

"I fell pregnant and it was towards the end of our relationship. So it was not this happy, exciting [time]… it was 'oh God, I'm pregnant'. Whilst he wanted to fight for the relationship, I didn't feel he was happy either," she said.

"I knew that we just weren't each other's people. I'd had a child before. I was very young, I was 19, I got married, and I separated from that person, and mentally I knew there was no way I could bring another child into the world and come away from it mentally unscathed."

The pregnancy was a shock to them both. "He was just as shocked as I was because I had the Mirena [a type of IUD birth control] in for many years, and all of a sudden I'm pregnant."

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Alex went on to reveal that Bachelor In Paradise producers wanted her to avoid explicitly talking about her abortion on the reality show. "I was encouraged not to openly say what it was. I was told, 'You can allude to it, say as much as you want that you're comfortable with, but maybe have a bit of ambiguity around it'."

As for whether she broke up with Richie over a text message, this was true. "I knew pretty soon that it wasn't going to have longevity. But I had this thing where I've just done this huge show, I got to the end and people hated me for it, and now I'm having doubts very soon in," the mum-of-three recalled.

Mamamia spoke to Alex about the reaction she had received from speaking openly about her abortion, and sadly, the response wasn't positive.

She shared that some anti-abortion trolls had been in her DMs since the podcast was released.

"People do not have to agree with a woman's choice to terminate a pregnancy, but they absolutely do not get to dehumanise her/them for it!" she told Mamamia.

"There is no shame in making a legal and medically supported decision about your own body, a decision that was right for you at that moment in your life."

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Thankfully, the conversation has also provided comfort for women who have made the same decision.

"I've had several women message me saying that they appreciated the conversation around it so much as they have carried this huge shame around their choice to terminate," she said.

"I just hope I can ease those feelings with my own feelings towards my experience."

Looking back on her time on Bachelor In Paradise — where she made connections with both Brooke Blurton and Bill Goldsmith — she claimed she was misled into joining the show.

"I was told he [Richie] wasn't [on the show]... the cast and crew had chased me for a little while, initially I said no. And then I was chasing reassurance, 'Will he be there? Because if he's there, I do not want to go on that show'," she said.

"They had told me that he had declined, and then I agreed once I got confirmation that he declined."

These days, Alex is busy raising her three kids in Beechworth, a picturesque town in Victoria where she runs a short-stay company with her fiancé, Carson Jory.

In the decade since Richie first appeared on Sam Frost's season of The Bachelorette, he's maintained a very low public profile.

Feature image: Ten/Instagram/@alexandranation.