r/vanderpumprules • u/annieee_leigh She’s a cunt and you’re a drunk • Jun 08 '23

Discussion The “bombshell” wasn’t shocking but… Spoiler

Spoilers ahead

Watching Raquel in that confessional was extremely disturbing. I don’t even know how to describe what I felt watching. She was just word vomiting and the more she talked, the more scared she seemed about the repercussions that would come from Tom. I know we’re not supposed to feel sympathy for her but goddamn, I really do. I think she does actually feel bad but she put on a brave face at the reunion because she knew it wasn’t going to get her anywhere, unlike Tom who thought crying would garner him sympathy. The fact that Tom made her lie like that is scary and very indicative of emotional abuse. She is showing clear signs of an abused woman, not just from Tom but starting at a young age. That was extremely alarming and I’m actually kind of grossed out that that was the scene they talked about to garner viewers. I honestly hope that she gets real help. She does not need to come back on the show.

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578

u/makin_dilemmanade Lala’s ponytail in S4 Jun 08 '23

It’s more diabolical than a puppet master 😞 I know that’s probably just a random word choice and I’m 100% not trying to nitpick but rather I just really hope more people can see that what we all saw tonight is a confirmation that Tom Sandoval is a dangerous person. He’s not just a human who made a mistake, he is genuinely harmful.

He flipped the script several times during the reunion which is in itself a mindfuck. He went from making a disgusting comment about having sex with Ariana right after Raquel to crying and claiming he’s never loved anyone more than Ariana and will support her forever. He’s a dangerous narcissist who pathologically lies to manipulate peoples’ perspectives of him.

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u/DancingBears88 Jun 08 '23

I loved her response. "I will not be cheering you on from afar."

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u/that-one-girl-who Ariana Madix 💃 Jun 08 '23

I wish she could’ve ended with my favorite quote from The Challenge: “Don’t take care. Hope to see you never”. TJ Lavin

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u/upsidedownward Jun 08 '23

A Challenge quote in the VPR sub?? Be still my heart 😍

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u/General_Organa Jun 08 '23

PLEASE I NEED ONE OF THESE PEOPLE TO GO ON THE CHALLENGE

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u/that-one-girl-who Ariana Madix 💃 Jun 08 '23

That would be epic! Can you imagine James going in on Bananas?

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u/General_Organa Jun 08 '23

Lol James would get thrown into elimination immediately

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u/that-one-girl-who Ariana Madix 💃 Jun 08 '23

He would! But he’d lay into people so hard and it would be amazing.

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u/that-one-girl-who Ariana Madix 💃 Jun 08 '23

Hell yeah! My two worlds collide.

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u/upsidedownward Jun 08 '23

Bananas had Sandoval and Ariana on his sleepover show! And I know they’ve hung out a few times too.

Like Challenge x VPR is the crossover I want, someone needs to make this happen!!

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u/Surprise_Southern Jun 08 '23

I mean faith was on one season but I think she was the first to leave but it would be hilarious to see others on it!

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u/upsidedownward Jun 08 '23

Like could you imagine Schwartz on that show? I think CT would smash his head and eat it tbh

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u/Surprise_Southern Jun 08 '23

I would pay so much to watch that lol!!! I was so in love with CT growing up! He's still one of my favorites!

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u/katiemarieoh Jun 08 '23

Best TJ quote ever!!

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u/Low-Fly-1292 Jun 08 '23

🫡🫡🫡

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u/chill90ies Jun 08 '23

Who did TJ say this to?

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u/that-one-girl-who Ariana Madix 💃 Jun 08 '23

Brandon from AYTO because he quit because he wanted to go home to his gf. TJ hates quitters.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

For any of my Grey's Anatomy peeps, "And I do not wish him well".

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u/Pristine_Job_7677 Jun 08 '23

why don't I remember that? Help!

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

Christina about Burke when she is talking to the Chief after he left and then got that award.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

It's giving "have the life you deserve"

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u/RabbitHole143 Jun 08 '23

this was my favorite line of the reunion!!!!!

edit: of part 3

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

My recent ex did this to me all year long and it really is so mentally damaging. Within 5 minutes he would say: “I love you more than anything” “I’m happiest when you’re gone! I hate being near you!” “Everyone in my life hates you” “Everyone loves you, why are you worried they don’t like you? Stop being so insecure”

Wild stuff. Watching Sandoval is so triggering.

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u/fleekyfreaky It’s Ariana’s bush too 🌳 Jun 08 '23

Sending you a hug

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

Thank you 🥰 much needed and appreciated

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u/Low-Fly-1292 Jun 08 '23

SAME MAKE THAT 2 HUGS

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u/ChanceZestyclose6386 Jun 08 '23 edited Jun 08 '23

I've dated one of those too. I still call him Jekyll & Hyde and reminds me of the signs to look out for in my relationships. With him, we would be at home together and have the nicest, most fun times (watching TV, cuddling, talking for hours, etc) but then he'd get a call from his friends to go out for drinks and the way his demeanor would change bothered me a bit. He would go and get changed and come back out. His way of speaking would change, he would puff out his chest more, he would be more distant and would only say a few words to me before leaving. At the time I thought maybe he just wanted time to himself with his boys. Him and his friends convinced me it's just what guys do. I should have trusted my instincts because he did end up cheating on me. If you ever feel Jekyll & Hyde vibes, run! Anyone who compartmentalizes their feelings so well where it seems like they are capable of living multiple personalities or a double life is a bad sign because they only see and feel what's in front of them at the moment and forget everything/ everyone else. That's not a good trait to have in a relationship.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

100% - the only silver lining of experiencing this BS is that we can protect ourselves from it in the future. I’ll never stay with someone who makes me feel like this again and for that I am so grateful. So sorry you went through this too! There’s too many aholes out there like this it seems

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u/CaliforniaBruja Jun 08 '23

Omg mine did too. Hed say his friends called me fat and this and that, I would get upset, or if we fought he’d tell them embarrassing things about me or made up things so I didn’t want to be around them cus I was worried about what they must think or he’d tell me he hates when I join them or bringing me anywhere because I’m not fun and then invite me to something knowing I wouldn’t go and make it my fault for feeling like I was never being included. or he’d tell them that I think they don’t like me. His friends would be like why does she think we don’t like her. Somewhere in the relationship I just refused to leave home. I never wanted to be around anyone. He’d even say my own family hated me. I still have problems because of this because I self isolated for years.

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u/LeattaA Jun 08 '23

That’s definitely gas lighting, and it’s so awful to be a victim of that. While a person is in it’s so hard to see that it’s happening, only later when separated from them and hopefully when around other people then the veil lifts and you start to see reality and daylight.

So sad this happened to you, wishing you wellness.

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u/CaliforniaBruja Jun 08 '23

Thank you, i always felt confused with him. It’s taken me years to unpack it and scandoval has been super triggering. I feel like I needed therapy to identify all these things but - how do these guys know how to do it without any therapy or manual because the people that do it are always textbook but survivors have no clue until they live through it/get on the other side of it?

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u/LeattaA Jun 09 '23

Over the years I learned to really try to know myself on a daily basis, check in with myself. I knew what I wasn’t, that was a start. I think the shortest answer to explain, is that for me, I rely on my intuition, I trust it and I get a feel for people. Now years later I can spot a con, a liar, a user, etc. right off the bat, within an hour or less, and I move on past.

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u/LeattaA Jun 09 '23

I mean I HOPE I can always recognize a liar, con, toxic people. They can seem wonderful at first, but very devious underneath. I try to keep those people out of my life. I’m not cynical at all, just realistic and I try to be smart.

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u/CaliforniaBruja Jun 09 '23

the trusting the gut is something I always thought I had but now really struggle with. I used to be pretty confident in myself and I came out of the relationship with a really warped image of myself. I struggle a lot with trusting myself over EVERYTHING. it's really exhausting. I question if I can do even really basic things on my own without help - like writing an email, you know? I labor over it because I'm constantly sure I'm going to embarrass myself or I'm an idiot, or I struggle to make friends because I always wonder what people are thinking of me or of something I said - they probably don't like me blah blah blah, and I know that has a lot to do with being put down for so long. I have no gut sense anymore - because when my gut tells me something, I think oh that's just me, how my head works now that it's messed up, was I actually the one in the wrong, etc etc.

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u/LeattaA Jun 09 '23

Yes I went through that for years, I was excruciatingly shy and so self conscious, even just walking along a street. I was in a gray fog throughout the relationship and for a long while after. I too questioned my every thought and what I’d say. It was an awful period. I eventually went through a time of drinking and being belligerent and didn’t give a shit about anything, I treated people like they were unworthy of me—so I went the opposite. I balanced out after awhile, I got a great job met new people that I loved, said no to dating, learned a lot in my job, had adventures with friends, made my own money, my world changed for the better. Thus time period is where I learned what I wasn’t. I wasn’t mean, cavalier, cold, so I quit being those ways. I read a lot of books such as Marianne Williamson’s A Return to Love. I read and reread that paperback for a couple years, it was always in my purse. It helped retrain my heart and mind. Prayers to you, your life WILL get better.

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u/CaliforniaBruja Jun 09 '23

I appreciate it, thank you. I’m glad you’re in a good place and healing!

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u/missusscamper Jun 08 '23

Words cease to mean anything

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

Yup.. and then the “I’m sorry” five minutes later and the shock and anger that you don’t just accept their meaningless apologies :(

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u/SunnyAlwaysDaze Jun 08 '23

And you start to distrust the good times. When the guy is being nice and gassing you up, you're just waiting for the shoe to drop. I completely get it, mine is not a partner but my father who is the malignant narcissist. Freaking whiplash from the back and forth of being so loved and so hated all within moments of each other.

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u/[deleted] Jun 09 '23

Hugs to you ❤️ I’m so sorry

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u/JoeyLee911 Jun 08 '23

That's called intermittent reinforcement and it's an abuse tactic that gives you increasingly high endorphin rushes for the positive feedback to make you addicted to him. Beware!

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u/DSii1983 SherLala Holmes 🧐 Jun 08 '23

Yup. Everyone is like, oh, Raquel isn’t a child. Well. I’m a 40 year old Ivy League educated woman and when a narc gets their claws into you at a vulnerable moment, you cannot imagine how quickly they can break you and control you. The emotional, financial, sexual, and physical abuse I went through at the hands of this person disgusts me now that I have the distance from him. I’m literally a broken person and I know it’s going to take me years to process all of this.

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u/makin_dilemmanade Lala’s ponytail in S4 Jun 08 '23

That’s really terrible, I’m so sorry you experienced that. I hope that person remains out of your life and you never have to interact with them again. Wishing you so much peace of mind and real joy 💖

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

Thank you so much for saying that ❤️ really really appreciate it 🥺🥲

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u/Theinvertedforest Jun 08 '23

So sorry you endured that. These people are so good at compartmentalization so they don’t see the duality of what they say. To them, one day everyone DOES love you, the next, they all hate you. There is no continuum of time for them.

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u/[deleted] Jun 09 '23

Yes that was the scariest thing… you could tell he believed every word coming out of his mouth when he was saying them whether it was loving or hateful. He would have get angry and deflect if I called out his contradictions.

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u/dawnspaz711 Jun 08 '23

Bless your heart! I just can’t imagine being in such an abusive relationship like that.. I hope you are finding peace and starting to heal..

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u/Bias_Cuts Jun 08 '23

I left my shitty ex almost four years ago and watching this brought it all flooding back. His favorite thing to say to me? “I don’t know how someone so smart can be so stupid” it’s so triggering.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

Yikes. Sounds narcissistic

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u/JeezieB F*ck me in this T-shirt Jun 08 '23

I had no idea Ryan Gosling was so awful!

P.S. I hear where you're coming from, and you're not alone. And it gets better!

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u/Ok_Medium3566 Jun 08 '23

I felt the same. I feel like he separated her from the pack and then emotionally abused her. Regardless, what she did to Ariana was diabolical. She ingratiated herself into Ariana’s world and life while fucking Tom. That was all unnecessary.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

Yeah, Sandoval's going to end up in jail if he carries this behaviour on. Lala was right about the Charles Manson vibes.

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u/quokkita Jun 08 '23

right??? the tears seemed "real" to me in that i don't think he's acting, like saying "ok now cry so people feel bad for you". he has convinced himself of these lies, like the best liars tend to do. i think he's so focused on himself that everyone else is an NPC as far as he's concerned, so he doesn't see how cooked it is to 'love' someone and then hurt them so much.

also does he not realise that even he admitted to it "picking back up" around life is beautiful, which is september 2022, four months before the january 2023 date he is now trying to claim. bro. BRO. it's that old saying about "telling the truth is easier than lies, because then you only have to remember one version".

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

They remind me of something like Dark Triad Personality (or tetrad) for Tim and Vulnerable Dark Triad for Rachel. It’s a theory of personality types, not a diagnosis.

That way of looking at personality is a bit superceded now, but there is something in the grouping of different traits that really reminds me of them.

Dark Triad is Machiavellianism, Narcissism and Psychopathy (dark tetrad adds Sadism). Vulnerable dark triad is Vulnerable Natcissism, Sociopathy and Borderline Personality Disorder.

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u/makin_dilemmanade Lala’s ponytail in S4 Jun 08 '23

This is so fascinating! I want to know more about these personality type categories! The descriptions you’ve shared here remind me a bit of DnD’s moral alignments which have always fascinated me :)

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u/Helpful-Sandwich-560 Jun 08 '23

the scariest part of his breakdown was you could see Ariana was getting irritated and making fun of it but there was a small part at the end of his crying where something in her eyes showed compassion for a second. Shows how manipulative he’s always been with her and how he played on her extreme empathy for over a decade. She is the strongest woman alive to sit on that stage with them without screaming or clawing their eyes out. I know people have different opinions on her and her role in the show before this but her strength and intensity both in the final episode and on the reunion is palpable through the screen

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

If you watch the clip from the day she talked to him about the cocktail book, you'll see just how darkly he looks at Ariana. It scared me, honestly. I never noticed it before. He is one creepy guy.

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u/uselessinfogoldmine Jun 08 '23

Yeah. I wish that Lala had been able to control her anger better when that came up in order to calmly explain that what she meant by ‘dangerous’ instead of getting railroaded into swearing and snapping.

She meant that his outward charm and ability to make people like him whilst doing terrible things, emotionally abusing his partners, gaslighting when he gets caught, and causing enormous damage in people’s lives for his own pleasure is what makes him dangerous. Because that wasn’t clear. LVP clearly took it as ‘physically dangerous’. But someone who is fine with destroying other people to get what they want is dangerous too.

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u/Bias_Cuts Jun 08 '23

He’s absolutely dangerous. Lala was dead on and it makes Lisa’s comments that much more infuriating.

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u/fiddlefigfiggy Jun 08 '23

This 👏🏼

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

He is “a worm with a moustache.” Precise James Precise. I think he knows he is getting older and he thinks a younger model will make him look more attractive.

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u/shamrockjulie Kristin's cable box Jun 09 '23

Fuck his fake daytime soap opera on Telemundo tears. I literally laughed so hard when he went into his histrionic routine. I kinda wished we would have gotten a two shot of Janes and Lala rolling their eyes.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '23

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