Charity Lawson and Dotun Olubeko got engaged at the end of her season, which aired in 2023.
Charity Lawson and Dotun Olubeko will be hearing wedding bells in the not-so-distant future!
A year after Charity, 28, ended season 20 of The Bachelorette by choosing Dotun, 30, over Joey Graziadei -- who would later go on to become the next Bachelor and find love of his own with Kelsey Anderson -- the children and family therapist says she and her fiancé are in full-blown wedding prep, which she described as a complete "whirlwind."
"Wedding [planning] is definitely challenging but in the sense that it's just so much to prepare for and I did not know how much I was walking into," Charity told ET's Rachel Smith at the Variety Power of Women event on Thursday.
The Dancing with the Stars finalist added that they have finalized a date for the ceremony but are keeping it to themselves as they continue to take the planning process one step at a time. Charity says that considering how hectic their life post-Bachelorette is -- they just arrived back in the States after a trip to the Caribbean celebrating one year of being engaged -- they are happy to give themselves as much time as possible to prepare.
"2025, just know that," she shared. "So next year -- we've got time."
Charity added, "We're really just taking it day by day because we really just want to enjoy the planning of it all. So, I think we've given ourselves enough time to like hopefully not become too stressed. But we're moving along, slowly but surely."
While the season 20 finale of The Bachelorette aired in August, production on the show really wrapped in April 2023, specifically ending with Charity and Dotun's engagement on April 30. In an Instagram post on Tuesday, Dotun -- an integrative medicine consultant -- marked the anniversary by sharing pics of their trip to Grenada.
"One year later and the fantasy has become our reality. Your endless love is an experience, thank you for showing me what it’s supposed to feel like. Proud of you, proud of us. Learning more everyday that a good thing can just be a good thing. Cheers baby 🫶🏾," he wrote.
She told ET on Thursday that the trip was special for so many reasons, but especially since it gave them a chance to take a breath and reflect on how far they have come in the year since he got down on one knee.
"It was honestly such a dream," she detailed of their beach vacation. "Our past year has been -- has been so good and just honestly nothing really has changed which is like the beautiful part of it."
She continued,"We're like going into our normal lives now, everything’s slowing down, but in terms of where our relationship stands, it's still very much alive and it's a testament to how we really found true love on that show. Which is crazy to say but it works."
In August, ET spoke with the happy couple after the season finale to ask about adjusting to their new lives as an engaged couple and what comes next, including their impending nuptials and where they would live after the final rose.
"It's a sigh of a relief," Charity said of finally getting to show their love in public. "We're just so excited. This is the moment that we truly anticipated and [have] been waiting on since the beginning, since we ended everything in Fiji."
"Watching all of this back, it's been exciting, a little hard at times, but now that we're just able to just live life normally, that's something that we both want," she added. "... This is what it's all about."
Dotun agreed, telling ET, "You go through these stages, there's the filming stage and then there's after, which we just got done [with], now it’s the long haul."
Charity also gave her advice for the show's new leading lady, Jenn Tran, who was announced as The Bachelorette during Graziadei's finale in March. Lawson calls it a "huge, historic season" as Jenn, 26, is the first Asian Bachelorette.
"Never forget your purpose and what she's looking for and to ask the challenging questions," she said of what she told Jenn. "I think sometimes, people are scared to ask [questions] out of fear.. so I told her to stand her ground."
Jenn's season, which has yet to receive a release date, is historic in another way, as well. In April, ET exclusively revealed that her season will not be filming at the Bachelor Mansion. Rather, opening night festivities will take place at the Hummingbird Nest Ranch.
"I think what I've been trying to tell myself [is I'm the] first Asian Bachelorette, first PA student, we're really breaking the mold this season," Jenn said. "I feel like a new mansion is the perfect way to break the mold... I'm gonna bless it with some really good vibes."
RELATED CONTENT:
