Ben Higgins Breaks Silence on Lauren Bushnell Breakup

Ben Higgins is opening up about his split from Lauren Bushnell.

The Bachelor star implies that the breakup was a long time coming.

“Just to be as politically correct as possible and to also be as truthful as possible, Lauren will always be one of my best friends,” Ben said during a Bachelor Nation podcast (via E! News). “It’s [a relationship] where I learned a lot about myself; I think she learned a lot about herself. Obviously, she knows me better than anybody else that has gone through this experience, and really probably anybody else in the world. It’s tough.”

“It’s hard to say goodbye to somebody that you spent so much time with and it’s hard to say goodbye to somebody that you really did believe was the one for you,” Ben continued. “I think mutually Lauren and I saw that life was getting more difficult. I would say the joy that we felt toward our relationship at the beginning was�”for some reason�”slipping away, and we were both working very hard to bring that joy back. And it just never seemed to get there. So it was a long time coming but it wasn’t necessarily like we dragged it out.”

“It was for the best,” he added.