In a beautiful Alice Springs setting, Brooke approached Jimmy to hear the final verdict. Throughout their journey together the pair struggled to rectify her needs in a relationship with his busy work schedule.

“Whenever we spoke about the future it was always really difficult for us,” Jimmy said during the finale. “You are perfect in every way and I would never want to change you, but we are two different people and it breaks my heart that I have to say goodbye.”

Speaking to 10 play following the finale, Brooke echoed her words in the Ceremony, “Why here?”

“It was such a shock to me,” Brooke told 10 play over the phone. “When I came back into the Mansion I was confident that it was me. I thought me and him are so strong, I just felt like I had something so special and unique with him that I hadn’t really felt or seen before.”

As Jimmy broke the news to her, Brooke began to break down in tears. Looking back she reflected, “Why would he have brought me back, why would we have gone through this much for him not to chose me? It made no sense to me at all.

“We’ve been through so much, why here? Why now? Why not do this when it was like four or five of us left?”

Brooke’s shock at the result was also felt in the finale’s beautiful location.

“That place means so much to me,” she explained, “my sister lives there, there is so much meaning. It just made the heartbreak 10 million times worse. And he knew that.

“I don’t know what was going through his head, I don’t think he wanted to let me go.”

Throughout the journey, Brooke unabashedly wore her heart on her sleeve and spoke about her strong feelings for Jimmy, so much so that looking back she wished she had been let go earlier.

“I kind of wish he put me out of my misery at number four or three or something like that, rather than finals,” she said, adding, “I think I said to my dad before the show I’d rather come any number than number two.”

During the season, Brooke’s grandfather passed away and she immediately left the Mansion to be with her family back in Melbourne. She was given the opportunity to return to the house where she ultimately received the final single date. While difficult, Brooke had absolutely no regrets about her decision to return to the Mansion.

“I’m so happy I went back because, the thing is, if I didn’t go back I would be wondering ‘what if’ and that would rattle me more than anything. More than heartbreak. Anything,” she explained.

“I just wanted to know how we closed the book. Are we together? Do we not end up together? Can it work for us? There were just so many questions... I wanted to explore it and ‘what if’ will kill me for the rest of my life and that’s the truth.”

While some of the Bachelorettes struggled with being vulnerable, Brooke said she never had that issue and was proud to articulate what she needed from a relationship and her expectations of what life with Jimmy would look like.

“I didn’t want to finish the show and find me and Jimmy in a relationship and he’s like ‘far out, I told you my job and stuff’ and then I would sit there and think, well I didn’t get a chance to tell you what I’m like in a relationship. That would be a regret for me.

“I wasn’t perfect at this,” she continued, “I didn’t know what to do. I’ve never had so many people stare at me while I’m trying to flirt on national television and that’s what I said to Jimmy right from the beginning.

“I’m so raw, take me or leave me for who I am. I don’t make sense sometimes but that’s fine. I think he liked that, and he was good at comforting me on-camera and it did build our connection and it was those real moments in between filming that really formed what we had together.”

Brooke admitted she has no immediate plans to watch the finale, that it would bring up too many emotions while she’s still processing.

“I lay it all out there, and it’s still very heartbreaking. I think watching it is going to trigger too many emotions for me and it’s going to just take me back,” she said.

In the finale, sitting in the back of the car as she drove off Brooke put it best herself when she said, “I don’t know where that goes now. It’s just time. It’s time that will heal.”