Bachelor winner Irena Srbinovska returns to nursing

Irena Srbinovska has opened up about life after the show and having a baby with Locky Gilbert.

The Bachelor winner Irena Srbinovska is heading back to real life after a whirlwind year with boyfriend Locky Gilbert, revealing the mental toll of being on reality TV left her in tears “every day”.

The Melbourne nurse quit her job last year after being thrust into the spotlight and now, after travelling around Australia for 12 months, she’s returning to work on the front line with hopes of a more “normal” life.

“It’s exciting just to get back into it because I haven’t had a routine,” she said.

Locky Gilbert and Irena Srbinovska found love on The Bachelor last year. Supplied.

The Melbourne nurse has settled into life in Perth and is set to return to work. Picture: Marie Nirme.

While Srbinovska, 31, has been blissfully happy since finding love with Gilbert, 30, she admits being on a reality show took a huge toll, which prompted her decision to step away from work.

“I got really burnt out last year … I was overwhelmed,” she said. “Every day I’d sit in the car park and just cry, and I’d struggle to get myself out of the car to get to work.

“When you’re a nurse, you can’t be thinking about yourself. Once you step foot in a hospital, it’s all about your patients so I felt like I wasn’t giving my patients what they deserve so I made the hard decision to stop working. We jumped in the car and did a lap of Australia and now it’s back to reality, back to normal life.”

Srbinovska has settled into her new life in Perth after relocating for Gilbert.

After a devastating miscarriage, the couple haven’t given up on their dreams of marriage and children and are looking at buying their forever home.

While for many, reality TV has become somewhat of a launching pad to the influencer realm, Srbinovska is sticking to nursing.

Locky and Irena travelled around Australia for one year after The Bachelor. Photo: Instagram

“Going on The Bachelor, I was one of those stupid naive people that didn’t really think about social media,” she said.

“I know that some people automatically think you’re on reality TV and that’s where you’re going to go but my thing is I’m a nurse, I’m your everyday person. I’m not going to pretend to be someone that I’m not.

“Yes if there’s products and campaigns that I love and I want to share that with my followers I will do so but they’re only things that I’m passionate about and things I will actually use and support in my everyday life.”

Srbinovska said she prefers to use her platform for good.

“I don’t use it as a portal to be famous or to get money,” she said.

“If that was the case, I would not be going back to nursing because nursing does not pay as much as social media.

“I just want a normal life which I know I’m never going to have but as normal as I can get it.”

One particular cause that’s close to her heart is the Know Shingles campaign, which is designed to help raise awareness about the signs, symptoms and risk factors of the disease.

“I’ve looked after a lot of patients with shingles and it’s something that’s so common yet no one ever talks about it as there’s this stigma,” she said.

“For a few years I worked as a chronic pain nurse and an acute pain nurse and during that role I would treat patients with severe pain. The more I looked after patients with Shingles, the more I learned about the virus.

“It’s crazy that something as simple as a rash can do so much damage to the nerves under the skin. 1 in 3 people is likely to develop shingles and out of them 25 per cent will have chronic pain which can last for months. The numbers are staggering. I’ve seen the worst of the worst, it’s debilitating, it takes over your life. The best way to make sure you’re not going to get chronic pain is early detection and early treatment by speaking with your doctor for more information.”