BECKER, Minn. – It looked like a movie: On a recent episode of "The Bachelor," a horse-drawn carriage carried a young couple through rows and rows of evergreens. But for Daisy Kent, the Minnesotan on board, it was a typical Saturday night.
Just swap the white horses with a four-wheeler.
As a kid growing up on that same Christmas tree farm north of Becker, Minn., Kent and her four siblings would put on pajamas and pile into a big wagon hooked to that four-wheeler, said her mom, Julie Kent. "And then we would go out and we would pull them through the trees, looking up at the stars."
Kent, 25, is now sharing her life, including her childhood's central Minnesota setting, with the star of "The Bachelor," tennis pro Joey Graziadei, plus the millions of people watching, cheering and betting for or against their romance. She is one of the show's final three contestants.
At times, that childhood was as storybook as it might seem, Julie and Brandon Kent said on a recent Saturday morning at Dueling Brews, a Becker coffee shop. But as Daisy grew older, she began losing her health and her hearing. That's a tale she's told on the ABC-TV reality show, on her hugely popular TikTok and Instagram feeds and in her children's book, "Daisy Doo: All the Sounds She Knew," which Dueling Brews sells next to a sign urging people to support "one of Becker's own."
Though Kent now recounts that story with strength and a smile, "there were a lot of times in her life when she was really struggling," said her older brother, Milan Kent, holding his 2-month-old baby. "All the things she was going through were hitting really hard. She felt like she would never lead a normal life. So I think she's able to resonate with people in that sense, too.
"It's not all sunshine and roses — and she knows that."
'Nothing but a Daisy'
They made a deal: Julie Kent named the sons. Brandon Kent named the daughters. At first, Julie bristled at "Daisy," as it was the name of her grandmother's dog. But it ended up fitting her silly, bubbly girl.
"Now she's nothing but a Daisy," said Julie Kent, a first-grade teacher.
On the farm, which they owned for about a decade, their kids would zipline across the pond in the summers and skate on it in the winters. They rode ATVs and four-wheelers. "Nothing real fancy," as her dad said. Daisy loved to sing, pounding the piano.
When she was in grade school, her parents remember struggling to remove a tick that had burrowed into her scalp and taking her to the doctor. When she was 11 years old, she began having seizures. One doctor thought it was epilepsy. Another thought it was migraines.
At 17, she awoke to her dad shaking her and realized she couldn't hear him. She was diagnosed with Ménière's disease, a rare inner ear disorder.
As her hearing worsened, her brother Milan, who is just 13 months older than she is, encouraged her to get the cochlear implant she'd been weighing. Whenever they'd see friends, she'd keep having to ask "What?" and "Huh?" He told her: "You're missing so much!"
She found a doctor in California, where she now lives, whom she trusted and who was optimistic that the surgery, which involves implanting one piece of the electronic device in her head, would also ease her vertigo.
"I think a lot of it was the stigma, then," her father said. "You're in the deaf community, that whole thing."
His eyes filled with tears. He shook his head, sipped his coffee.
Weeks after getting the surgery, they activated the device. "As soon as she got it hooked up, all that stigma went away. She was just Daisy again."
'Incredible vulnerability'
In a video from that time, in April 2023, Kent sits in a doctor's office.
"Alright, are you ready?" an audiologist asks.
"I think ..." Kent begins, hesitant.
Then the audiologist turns on, for the first time, Kent's cochlear implant. "Can you hear anything?" she asks. Kent shakes her head. "Oh, yeah, I do hear a little bit. ... It sounds like aliens."
She smiles but still seems uncertain. There is no grand moment, no tears of joy, no cinematic swell. In fact, when Kent's mother, who is taking the video, talks, saying, "Daisy, I'm so proud of what you've done," her daughter still has trouble hearing her.
Jennie Antonakis stumbled upon the video as she was considering a cochlear implant for her son who, like Kent, had been diagnosed with profound hearing loss in one ear. Struck by Kent's vibrancy and honesty, Antonakis watched video after video. She reached out, and Kent replied right away. Over Zoom, Antonakis asked question after question.
The two became close and planned to meet in person last fall. Then, suddenly, Kent stopped replying. Antonakis later learned that she was filming "The Bachelor."
Watching it air, Antonakis has been amazed by Kent's "incredible vulnerability," she said. While someone else might have hidden their disability, Kent highlighted it. Antonakis and her 6-year-old son, Doni, who now has a cochlear implant, watched together as Kent explained her hearing loss to Graziadei.
"It takes a really special person to be that public about her journey and what it takes and what she's missing," Antonakis said. "That's why it's so important to me, because ..." Her voice caught. "I'm sorry; I'm getting emotional.
"Because she's paving the way for people like my son to be open about it."
Loving the spotlight
When Daisy told her parents that she'd been cast on "The Bachelor," they weren't surprised.
"About right," Brandon said.
Growing up, they'd watched "The Bachelor" together. And Daisy, her high school's homecoming queen, had long loved the spotlight, said her mother, who in her own youth had performed as a water skier at Sea World. Daisy often nabbed solos, including a Hannah Montana number. She was a natural public speaker, sharing her faith journey in 2022 at Free Grace United Church in Becker.
"I've had more doctors than I've had teachers," she said during that speech, captured on video. "And I've had more than triple the amount of hospital stays than I've had birthdays."
She talked about crying at night, thinking about not being able to hear her future children's voices, and about crying in the car, because her favorite songs no longer sounded like they once did.
"This last year has been the hardest year of my life because I hear different," she said, "but it's also been the best year of my life, because I hear God different."
Kent came into "The Bachelor" with a major social media following. Since then, it's swelled. As of last week, she boasted nearly 500,000 followers on Instagram, the most of any contestant. Before the show, she would post videos about life with a cochlear implant, telling stories, giving tips and answering questions major and minor, often while applying makeup.
Did you need to get speech therapy? How does music sound? Can you get it wet?
Since the show started airing in January, she's been taking a similar approach, posting thoughts about what it's been like to watch it amid the spoilers, the scrutiny and the comments about her vocal fry. ("It's just like unfortunate," she said, that people's hurtful comments "make me in my head about the way that I talk and speak.")
Her parents don't worry, though. She's handled tougher things.
"I think Daisy's very well grounded," her father said. "She's been through a lot of stuff. I think she'll be good."
