Vicki Gunvalson says being on the Real Housewives of Orange County broke up her family
Fans watched Vicki Gunvalson’s marriage to Donn Gunvalson fall apart on the early seasons of the Real Housewives of Orange County.
She kept complaining that her “love tank” was empty, asked for him to be more loving, but he kept pulling away while she broke down to friends that she was lonely and the marriage was cold and loveless. The marriage ended, after 19 years, and she moved on to on-off boyfriend, Brooks Ayers.
Vicki recently admitted, though, there’s a chance she and Donn might have stayed together if she had never taken a part on Real Housewives. “I think that my family would still be together. There’s some really great things that have come from the show, but one of the downsides was that it broke up my family, and that’s tough to take,” she told Digital Spy.
“I think the show had a lot to do with me getting divorced. I think it was too much pressure on a weak marriage. I wonder where Donn and I would be now if we didn’t do the show. But we elected to do the show together as a family. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out for us,” she added.
“It’s not easy to be judged, to be ridiculed, to be talked down to,” she says, admitted she constantly thinks about quitting.
“I’m not a quitter,” she adds of her reasons for staying, “And I feel like the viewers still want to see me. My story’s not over. I try to bring some good to the show, as best as I can, to inspire single women.”