The Untold Truth Of Vicki Gunvalson

When you think of The Real Housewives of Orange County, original cast member and resident firecracker Vicki Gunvalson probably comes to mind. She has been at the reins of the Bravo TV reality series since its 2006 debut — thanks, in part, to her high-strung personality, tumultuous love life (ahem, Brooks Ayers), and never-ending love for whooping it up. Woo Hoo! RHOC does a very good job at chronicling the insurance-selling guru's extravagant lifestyle behind the gates of the exclusive community of Coto de Caza, but this mom of two announced that she was moving into a new phase of her life after getting engaged to beau Steve Lodge in an April 2019 Instagram post. 

While her walk down the aisle will hopefully be televised, RHOC fans are well aware that there's much more to the tequila-loving Illinois native's life than the camera lenses can capture. Gunvalson went from being in an alleged abusive marriage to becoming one of the top sales agents in the insurance industry. And that's just one small portion of her dynamic life story. Here's the untold truth of Vicki Gunvalson.

Vicki Gunvalson grew up in Illinois and was one of five children to her subcontractor father and her housewife mom. Sadly, her dad was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease at the age of 59. While Gunvalson told Think Advisor in 2015 that he should've lived to "to 85 or 90," based on the disease's life expectancy, he unfortunately passed away at the age of 67. "He was robbed," she said. "And it was hard on us emotionally and financially."

Indeed, it was her parents' lack of long-term insurance that actually sparked Gunvalson's desire to join the insurance industry. After she and her sister began chatting "about their parents' retirement problems," they both realized it was something that was lacking on a larger scale. Gunvalson explained to Think Advisor, "[My sister and I are] both really passionate about wanting to help people and educate them that what happened to my family could just as easily happen to them."

Catch an episode of The Real Housewives of Orange County and, chances are, you'll see Vicki Gunvalson working hard for the money. For many years, the television personality was the only housewife who held down a job, according to her 2010 interview with the Daily Herald. As the president and founder of COTO Insurance & Financial Services, the bubbly blonde beaut has been providing retirement planning, as well as health and life insurance services, for nearly three decades.

Running a $15 million dollar annuity business means Gunvalson is, of course, super busy — so much so that she once admitted that her hectic work schedule has sometimes caused her to lack in certain areas of her life. In particular, this famous businesswoman often forgoes sleep for the sake of her job, which also caused strain on her second marriage to then-husband, Donn Gunvalson (but more on this below). "God gives us 24 hours in a day," Vicki Gunvalson told Haute Living in 2010. "When I get up there to see him I'm going to tell him I needed 36 to 40. I push so much into one day because I feel lost if I don't." 

After Vicki Gunvalson married Donn Gunvalson in 1994, he proudly stood by her side when The Real Housewives of Orange County debuted in 2006. However, it wasn't long before their relationship began to unravel and Vicki told her then-husband her love tank was "empty" (via People). While they were able to work through their relationship struggles and even renewed their vows in a 2009 episode of RHOC, their marital woes were just way too much for Vicki to handle. According to TMZ, she filed for divorce the following October.

Months after pulling the plug on her marriage, Vicki ultimately blamed the series for ruining her love life, telling CNN, "Six years ago when Donn and I started, we didn't have 90 percent of the problems that we have now and I truly believe it is the show. We had a good foundation." Between filming RHOC and running her business, there simply weren't enough hours left in the day for Vicki to dedicate to Donn: "If I didn't have the show I would have had more time for him. That's the reality."

She isn't the only RHOC star whose marriage ended while filming. Tamra Judge (pictured, left), Shannon Beador (pictured, center), and a bevy of other Bravo castmates also saw their relationships implode on camera, according E! News. So, maybe there's some truth behind Gunvalson's statement after all?

Some celebrities play coy about their plastic surgery procedures, but Vicki Gunvalson isn't one of them. In addition to "a fat transfer to her face, a nose job and a chin implant" back in 2013, according to Entertainment Tonight, the Bravo TV cameras were on hand to film the recovery process after Gunvalson received a lower face lift in 2018. Following that final tweak, Gunvalson promised her boo, Steve Lodge, she was "done" with plastic surgery. But was she being honest?

Her fans held her to that promise, so you can imagine the level of outrage that ensued in March 2019 when Gunvalson was accused of going under the knife again. For her part, Gunvalson later shared a snapshot of herself recovering in a hospital room and insisted she had undergone "another NON ELECTIVE procedure" in the caption. In other words, the RHOC star wanted to make it clear that she did not break her oath to refrain from visiting her plastic surgeon, though not many people believed her.

Even if she had, it's her business. But since Lodge himself was so adamant about Gunvalson staying away from the scalpel, we doubt he would've posed by her bedside with a huge smile and a thumbs up if she'd ignored his wishes, right? Either way, get well soon, Vic'!