‘I was very confident’: When did Theresa Nist know that Gerry Turner would propose to her on ‘The Golden Bachelor?’

The inaugural season of The Golden Bachelor finally came to a close on November 30, ending with what might just be the best proposal Bachelor Nation has ever seen…

After two months of sending wonderful women home week after week, it looks like Gerry Turner found his perfect match in the one and only Theresa Nist, a 70-year-old financial services professional from New Jersey, deeming her to be the woman whom he “cannot live without” during the highly-anticipated finale — how sweet is that?

Losing his wife and high school sweetheart to illness after being married for 43 years, Gerry embarked on his second chance (or maybe his third chance?) at finding love as the lead of the first-ever season of The Golden Bachelor, coining the phrase, “It’s never too late to fall in love again.” After a month of filming, the 72-year-old restaurant owner from Indiana got down on one knee, surprising Theresa with a stunning Neil Lane ring.

Was this proposal really a surprise? Keep scrolling to find out for yourself…

Shocking fans of The Bachelor franchise across the country, Gerry Turner shared with PEOPLE that he told Theresa Nist he would propose to her while in the Fantasy Suite, despite the runner-up, Leslie Fhima, still being in the competition — how wild is that?

“Part of our conversation in the Fantasy Suites was the first time really that I seriously told her that I loved her,” Gerry admitted in an exclusive interview with Dana Rose Falcone. “It was almost an announcement of excitement. I said it three times in a row, ‘Theresa, I love you. I love you, I love you’ and I go, ‘I’m going to ask you to marry me. I don’t know if you’re going to say yes, but I’m going to ask you.’”

“For me, when I got to the final episode and the engagement was about to happen, I was very confident that she was my person. One hundred percent confident,” he concluded with a beaming smile.

While both Gerry and Theresa were on the same page that they would get engaged to one another that day, the latter was still unaware whether or not Leslie was still in the picture.

“When she came down the walkway, she didn’t know if she was the first person making that walk or the second person or the only person,” Gerry admitted in the same interview.

Nonetheless, Theresa was confident, revealing that the conversations between her and Gerry in the Fantasy Suite told her everything she needed to know heading into the big day.

“What they didn’t see in the Fantasy Suites was everything,” she gushed. “When he presented me with the Fantasy Suite card, I was so enthusiastically accepting it, because I really wanted to go in and delve deeper, and that’s what we did. It was the first time I really showed my true personality to him. He did know, but not as in-depth.”

Naturally, Gerry and Theresa’s time in the Fantasy Suite was equally as pivotal for the Golden Bachelor himself.

“In my head, I had this checklist of four or five things that, ‘I got to know this stuff,’” he dished. “She accepted to go into the Fantasy Suite, and those four or five things, before I even had a chance to ask them, she was like, spouting it out there. She was like, ‘Okay, and this is going to happen, and I want you to know this and this’ and it’s like, ‘Oh my God, we are exactly on the same page.’”

As we know, those one-on-one conversations with no camera crew present are what allowed Gerry to determine that Theresa was his perfect match, ultimately leading to their engagement during the tear-jerking finale of The Golden Bachelor.

To relive the engagement between Gerry and Theresa, you can stream said finale of The Golden Bachelor now via Hulu.