Salley Carson joined the cast of Southern Charm on season 10, but her Charleston, S.C., journey began after she ended her engagement.
“When I was 22 years old, I got engaged,” Carson, 30, recalled on the Jan. 16 episode of Southern Charm. “We had the big house and like, he wanted kids, and I thought that I had everything. And then, 25 days before the wedding, I got a DM that he had been cheating on me, so I canceled the wedding and moved to Charleston. And that’s kind of when Single Salley came back full force.”
After that, Carson also appeared on Clayton Echard’s season of The Bachelor, though she left before limo arrivals. Carson describes her relationship as “really toxic” to PEOPLE, adding that now, “I’m in a completely different place than I was when I was on The Bachelor.”
Bachelor Nation gave Carson a hard time for going on the show merely weeks after calling off her engagement, but the reality star says she didn’t seek out the opportunity. Instead, producers reached out to her about looking for love with Echard, 31.
“When I was going through that with The Bachelor, I was reading all the comments, I was on Reddit. I was being so insecure and I was really sad and depressed,” says Carson, who also appeared on Southern Hospitality. “And then I went to therapy and got out of that relationship and I feel like I truly am he strongest that I’ve ever been. I’ll read comments today and it makes me giggle.”
Carson returned for Bachelor in Paradise in 2022, but she exited after her castmates learned she’d recently spoken to her ex. “I’ve been through a lot with The Bachelor,” she admits. “Those shows taught me how to be confident outside of the haters because I really don’t care.”
On the current season of Southern Charm, Carson is seeing Andrew Dietz, who her costar Taylor Ann Green also dated.
“Andrew is not my usual type,” Carson said on the Jan. 16 episode in a confessional interview. “I am typically with like, a businessman, I feel like. You know, really aggressive. But Andrew wants to communicate everything and talk so soft. I don’t know, but I like that my type’s changing.”
Carson and Dietz have since split, and she feels grateful for that.
“Looking back at it, I’m kind of glad it happened because we weren’t a good fit anyways,” Carson tells PEOPLE. “I wasn’t me in the relationship at all. I was very much this workout, no drinking girl. I tried to be what he wanted me to be and please him, and it’s just not who I am. Now, nobody’s going to stop me from partying!”
Now, Carson wants to give herself time to be single. “I know that at the end of the day, I have great friends, I have a great family, I have a great career, I have great people in my life and it doesn’t really matter what outsiders think at all,” she says. “Single Salley will be in season 11!”
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Southern Charm airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. ET on Bravo and can be streamed the following day on Peacock.
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