Ben Higgins says he’s happy for his former fiancée, Lauren Bushnell. The Bachelor winner, who ended her engagement to Higgins in 2017, began dating country singer Chris Lane late last year, and their relationship progressed as fast as a season of The Bachelor .
Chris Lane popped the question to the show’s fan favorite during a cookout at Bushnell’s family’s home in Oregon. The singer played a song he wrote for Lauren called “Big, Big Plans,” and in the lyrics, he asked her to marry him, People reports. Lane then proposed with a 3.5-carat emerald-cut diamond solitaire set on a pave band.
Now that Chris Lane has put a ring on it, Bachelor star Ben Higgins says he couldn’t be happier for his ex. On his Almost Famous podcast, Ben said he hopes Lauren’s new engagement will give them both distance from their Bachelor past, according to Page Six .
Higgins told fans that he hopes that amid Bushnell’s engagement to another man, that his life “isn’t as closely tied to Lauren anymore.”
“I hope this is a chapter being closed completely because I don’t know Lauren anymore and my life isn’t tied to her.”
The Bachelor star, who proposed to Lauren Bushnell on the rose-filled reality show’s Season 20 finale in 2016, also wished his ex the best as she starts her new life with another man.
“I want nothing but joy and everything that our relationship couldn’t have brought you in Chris. Lauren, congratulations for you…You found a man that you love without any pressure and … I could not be more excited for you.”
Bachelor breakup – what went wrong for Ben & Lauren https://t.co/Yu9JscpbIl pic.twitter.com/WLE879KY7O
— ET Canada (@ETCanada) May 16, 2017
While Lane’s proposal to Bushnell comes after just seven months of dating, fans aren’t totally surprised that he’s ready to settle down with the former reality star. In January, just two months into Lauren and Chris’s relationship, Us Weekly noted that the country star posted a photo with Lauren’s father as the two played golf and he captioned it with: “Great day on the course with my potential future father-in-law.”
And at the 2019 Academy of Country Music Awards in April, Chris told Entertainment Tonight he was “working on” a marriage proposal for Lauren. Lane vowed to propose to Bushnell by the end of this year and teased that it would be a “100 percent” traditional proposal with him getting down on one knee.
“Don’t tell her that, though. I’m a country boy, that’s how you’re supposed to do it,” Lane said.
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Lauren Bushnell began dating Chris Lane in November 2018 shortly after her split from Devin Antin, whom she met on Tinder after she ended her engagement to Ben Higgins in 2017. Earlier this year, Ben Higgins revealed he has a new girlfriend named Jessica Clarke.
You can see Chris Lane’s sweet proposal to Lauren Bushnell below.