Shocking Truth! The Real Reason Why Dina Lupancu’s Parents Refused to Do a Hometown Visit on ‘The Bachelor’

Tonight’s hometowns episode of The Bachelor was a shocker, as one of Grant Ellis’ final four women didn’t even introduce him to her family!

As fans of the hit ABC reality show know, it’s crucial for the top contestants to let the star meet their loved ones at this point in the dating competition. Having family members approve is an important milestone to help The Bachelor determine his final pick.

 

But Dina Lupancu told a clearly disappointed Grant on Monday’s Episode 6 that he wouldn’t be meeting her kin, because her conservative pastor father disapproved of the whole concept of a man starting out dating 25 women. After the lack of family interaction, Grant, 31, eliminated Dina, moving on to fantasy suites with his final three: Juliana, Litia, and Zoe.

Dina’s family snub explanation was brief on the show, and she and Grant did meet a gaggle of her female friends for her hometown experience in Chicago. However, Dina revealed to Parade in an exclusive interview the real reason her folks and 11 siblings didn’t share in the hometown visit with Grant.

“I think the focal point of the hometown episode was the fact that my family wasn’t there,” she admitted.

The high-powered attorney, now 32, whose big family is headed up by her Romanian immigrant father Constantin Lupancu, said he supported her being on The Bachelor at first.

Dina told Parade about the Chicago Pentecostal minister, “My dad was actually for it. He thought that it was an interesting experiment; it intrigued him. But he [later] claimed that he didn’t know that there was an engagement at the end. He was like, ‘How could a guy go from dating 25 girls in such a short period of time, and make that type of commitment at the end of this?’ It just didn’t sit well with him, and also he wasn’t actually familiar with the dynamics of the show. He didn’t realize that there’s a camera the whole time.”

Dina, who doesn’t currently belong to her father’s church, continued, “In his mind, he’s like, ‘I’m this figure in the church.’ And it’s important that he keeps a certain example for other families. So he thought the show was something it wasn’t, and that’s my fault for not explaining it. I kind of told [my dad] the basics. ‘It’s a guy and he’s a great guy and he’s got this and that going for him and he’s just looking for his person and it’s a little bit of an experiment.’ I might have glossed over the engagement part. I know I told him, but we weren’t going into great detail. He was like, ‘Oh, yeah, that sounds great. You’re going to be able to have an adventure and learn a lot about yourself. Hopefully you come home really happy with a man.’ ”

Dina noted that, because she comes from a huge family, it was hard to inform everyone what The Bachelor entailed.

“I just didn’t prepare them enough,” she sighed.

When the hometowns visit subject came up, Dina’s dad allegedly said, “‘Hold up. Hold the phone. She just left. What do you mean we have to meet Grant? She’s going to [potentially] get engaged in two weeks?’ That was a no go!”

Dina told Parade that her mother, who also grew up in Romania, didn’t want a hometown visit for another reason.

“My mom didn’t want to be on TV. That was a big one for her,” Dina explained. “She didn’t want to expose herself in that way. She’s a mother of 11 kids. She went through a lot in life and she’s like, ‘I don’t need to be put through one more [thing].’ For her, this would be the biggest hurdle. It’s so exposing for yourself and your family, and she was not happy about it. She wants me married, though, so that part, she was like, ‘Listen, if you find your man, more power to you.’”

Dina implied that some family members were more on board with her The Bachelor participation than others.

 

She wonders if things might have been different with Grant. “I [should] have went back and really stressed and advocated for my family to be there, and talk to them and try to get them to show up for me and not fight about it. Ultimately, I made the decision to not have them come because I didn’t want the fighting. And me having to convince them, ‘Hey, I’m going to get engaged to this guy in two weeks’ when I couldn’t convince myself at that point. And I also didn’t want to do that to them when they were at odds with one another.”

The stunning lawyer said on camera that she’s often perceived as an “ice queen” and also stood out by feuding with fellow contestant Carolina, although they mended fences on the show.

Dina noted of her relationship with Grant, “I don’t think that I opened up quite as quickly as I could have at times and even in my hometown, when I broke the news to Grant that my family wasn’t going to be there, I kind of skirted around the whole thing and tried not to highlight it and wanted to run away from any uncomfortable feelings…and then when he asked me how I felt about it, I kind of dodged the question. I didn’t really want to talk about it. I wish that I would have given him more space to feel like he could talk to me about it, and said, ‘This is really important, and the potential to get engaged in two weeks, so how could I not meet your family?’ This is really devastating for me and I feel like that’s my fault because I never gave him that space. I think that was ultimately my demise.”

Related: The Bachelor‘s Arie Luyendyk Jr. Shares Major Family Update

Dina revealed that now that she’s going to be looking for a new guy, her father might insist on playing matchmaker!

“My dad likes to set people up,” she smiled. “My dad set up my oldest brother with someone in the Philippines that he adored and they have been married for 12 years so that worked out so he thinks that he has the magic touch so he’s always trying to set me up which means I have to get ahead of it and find someone before my dad tries to set me up. I don’t know how. I don’t know when.”

Summing up her Bachelor experience, Dina told Parade, “Do I think that Grant ultimately was my person? No. That’s okay. I have to take everything I learned and make sure I’m open and vulnerable in my next relationship.”