Teresa Giudice on What Felt ‘Esteem a Knife Merely Through My Heart’ When She First Watched RHONJ (This twelve months!)

Teresa Giudice can have been on The Actual Housewives of Contemporary Jersey for 12 seasons, but that would now not mean she’s seen a single episode of the Bravo hit.

With a itsy-bitsy more than a month to circulation except the season 13 premiere, Teresa exclusively tells PEOPLE that she completely started watching the level to that made her smartly-known this past twelve months — and it be all resulting from the drama that’s unfolded with brother Joe Gorga and sister-in-law Melissa Gorga.

“I’m watching the level to for the principle time because I by no technique watched it sooner than. And in the event you listen, after I change into as soon as on the reunions, Andy Cohen would place a seek recordsdata from to me questions and I would now not know what he change into as soon as talking about,” she explains. “All americans knew I change into as soon as now not watching the level to.”

As for why she began her belated binge, the 50-twelve months-aged mother of 4 explains, “I fair wished to educate myself and to peer what my brother and sister-in-law had been announcing about me.”

“I have been seeing all this on Instagram, these accounts which can maybe be posting past episodes. And I’m watching and I’m delight in, ‘My brother said that? My sister-in-law said that?’ So then I started watching and I’m delight in, ‘Now, I bought my answer,'” she says. “But I may now not leer it [initially] because it change into as soon as so laborious for me to relive it. And correct ingredient I didn’t leer it motivate then, because now I’m seeing what my brother and my sister-in-law change into as soon as announcing about me motivate then, oh my God. It change into as soon as delight in a knife fair through my heart. I deem I would’ve reacted otherwise if I would’ve watched the level to.”

Teresa Giudice.
Jenna Russo, Quiet Procure Pictures & Videography, @silentcapturephoto

Through the years, Teresa has hit some rocky patches in her relationship with Joe and Melissa, each 43. Some of the stress stemmed from the fair troubles the Teresa and her ex-husband Joe Giudice faced years ago, whereas more present drama centered on Teresa’s treatment of the couple.

In Also can, the siblings bought into an explosive fight during season 12 reunion after Teresa called her younger brother a “bitch boy” and dismissively when put next him to a Housewife. The argument bought so intense between the 2 siblings that Joe walked off stage, threatening to “quit” the Bravo franchise.

Teresa later claimed she had apologized and mended things with her brother, but that change into as soon as completely the open of what change into as soon as to come motivate between them. In early August, PEOPLE confirmed that the Gorgas would now not be at Teresa and Luis “Louie” Ruelas’s marriage ceremony. (By that level, Teresa had already confirmed that Melissa would now not be a bridesmaid in her marriage ceremony.)

Two sources said Melissa and Joe backed out of attending two days sooner than the ceremony when untrue rumors about their marriage surfaced amid filming. Both Teresa and Louie’s actions on the time in the raze influenced the Gorgas’ decision.

“Teresa betrayed them in a implies that’s unforgivable,” one source said. “They’re now not going to celebrate Teresa’s new marriage when all she does is are attempting to plug aside theirs.”

“Or now not it is dim. I deem it be sad,” Melissa later told PEOPLE at BravoCon in October. “I wish we may additionally have long gone, nonetheless it is what it is. We will by no technique ranking that motivate, and I didn’t hold it.”

The Gorgas additionally addressed their decision to skip the Aug. 6 nuptials on the Melissa Gorga On Display podcast, with Joe announcing it change into as soon as “so, so laborious” for him to now not reduction, in particular since she’s his completely shut family that’s calm alive.

“To me, it change into as soon as devastating. It actually change into as soon as. It change into as soon as surely one of many hardest days of my life. It change into as soon as defective,” he said. “But listen: let’s return to the reunion. She did this, you perceive? This change into as soon as all on her. Right here’s what she actually wished. She didn’t desire [Melissa] in the marriage ceremony, she didn’t desire any of my adolescents in the marriage ceremony, she barely wished me.”

Melissa and Joe Gorga (left) and Teresa Giudice and Louie Ruelas (fair).
Charles Sykes/Bravo/NBCU Picture Financial institution/Getty; Jeff Kravitz/Getty

However, Teresa tells PEOPLE that she has a different level of view on the family drama — and stands by her decision to decrease ties with her brother and sister-in-law.

“Or now not it is been laborious since my family came on [the show],” she says. “I by no technique signed up to be on a TV level to with my family. This change into as soon as my ingredient. I change into as soon as pondering it. It change into as soon as something new for me, and it change into as soon as delight in my job, and I change into as soon as infected, and then impulsively I ranking bombarded and ambushed by my family. And it change into as soon as very sad, because I felt delight in my dream form of bought shattered.”

“I would’ve by no technique sucker-punched them delight in that, because I don’t roll delight in that. If they had been on a level to, I would’ve by no technique went on there and damage them the means they damage me. That’s now not my style. That’s now not the person I am,” she continues. “If anything else, I would’ve bought my receive ingredient, because I’m always that. I always make a selection to be different.”

She adds, “Now I know why I didn’t leer it. Perhaps it change into as soon as fair to retain the peace, for our family, for my fogeys … I kept peace whereas my fogeys had been alive. And now I actually have closure. Now I designate. I am residing in my fact. I in the raze came to my fact and I’m now not going to settle for this toxicity anymore. And I could maybe be the mama endure, defend my family.”

Teresa Giudice, Louie Ruelas and their adolescents.
Jenna Russo, Quiet Procure Pictures & Videography, @silentcapturephoto

The mum of 4 is now vowing to remain some distance flung from that very ingredient in the new twelve months: “Toxicity, surely toxicity,” she says of what she desires to circulation away dead in 2022.

“I come from a shrimp family and we had been actually shut. After which for something delight in this to happen, it change into as soon as actually laborious for me to address,” she notes. “I always tried to retain the peace and that’s why I kept my mouth shut for loads of years. But now… I will invent what’s correct for my family, correct for me, correct for my adolescents. And I fair desire peace. And that’s the explanation why any toxicity, [I have to] maintain it out.”

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Season 13 of The Actual Housewives of Contemporary Jersey premieres Feb. 7 at 9 p.m. ET on Bravo.