Golden Bachelorette Joan Reveals Why ‘Getting Engaged’ Wasn’t a ‘Necessity’ (Exclusive)

• After leaving Gerry Turner’s season, The Golden Bachelor In week 3 to be with her postpartum daughter, Joan Vassos makes her debut as the Golden Bachelorette on Wednesday, September 18
• Twenty-four men aged 57 and over will compete for the heart of Vassos during the first edition Golden bachelor party season
• Vassos tells PEOPLE she wanted to end her season with “someone I saw a future with,” but “didn’t have to leave engaged.”

Golden Bachelorette Joan Vassos didn’t need a ring at the end of her season, as long as she left with someone she saw a future with.

“I’ve said all along that I didn’t have to leave engaged,” Vassos, 61, tells PEOPLE in this week’s issue. “My goal was to leave in a committed relationship. I wanted someone that I could see a future with and see what it was like in the real world outside of Bachelor bubble. I didn’t want to go through all this and be in the same place as when I came to the mansion.”

The principal of a private school, who left early after Gerry Turner’s season, The Golden Bachelor to be with her daughter after the birth — and also went into her journey knowing she wouldn’t be moving from her Maryland home for a new relationship.

“I would never want to leave my family,” says Vassos. “My children and grandchildren all live very close to me and not being with them all the time wouldn’t work for me. They are the most important people in my life. I felt like anyone I would be a good match with would have the same family values ​​as me and wouldn’t want to leave their family.”

Vassos realized that she and a potential partner from the show had to “find another way to make it work” if they didn’t live in the same area.

“I thought that depending on your employment status, you could spend two weeks at their house and two weeks at your house, or have some other location where you could all come together and maybe each other’s families would come as well,” Vassos explained. “You figure it out for a while until you figure out a permanent arrangement, and that could feasibly take years.”

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One of Vassos’s suitors, Pablo, is from Maryland, which she didn’t expect. “When I started this journey, I assumed I wouldn’t have anyone from Maryland or a lot of people who were really desirable geographically,” she says. “But in the immediate present, I’m not leaving my kids. I don’t expect anyone to leave their family. You have to figure it out for yourself. You put the burden on yourself, not your family.”

While Vassos acknowledged that distance could be a factor in a relationship with someone she The Golden BacheloretteShe thought that participating in the show would make her more successful in finding a partner than dating apps.

“Up until that point, I really didn’t enjoy dating,” Vassos admits. “I tried a dating app. I always hoped that a friend would set me up with someone, but it didn’t seem to work. I wanted to date, but it seemed like such a hassle. I didn’t really know how to do it.”

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After Turner, 73, left the season, Vassos says she “didn’t really pursue dating anymore,” but remained focused on supporting her family.

“I posted a video earlier this year and I said my New Year’s resolutions, and one of them was to get back out there and start dating,” she recalled. “And then I got a call shortly after that saying they were looking at me as a potential Golden Bachelorette and was I interested? So I definitely did not date after that.”

While Vassos can’t say how her season will end, she hints that “the end result was exactly what it should have been.”

“The journey was amazing for me, and I ended up exactly where I think I should be,” she says. “I learned so much about myself. The journey was very revealing and it was joyful, it was exhausting. I can’t imagine my life now without having gone through this. I’m such a happier person at the end of this journey than I was before I started it.”

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The Golden Bachelorette premieres Wednesday, September 18 at 8:00 p.m. ET on ABC.