Tragic Details About Christine Quinn

Please note: This article contains references to postpartum depression, abusive language, and sexual misconduct.

As Christine Quinn's net worth perfectly reflects, the reality star's rise to riches is like living a dream come true. "My career was always about manifestation," she told People. "I wanted to be in these beautiful houses so desperately, and I knew, one day, I would live in one." Quinn lives with her tech entrepreneur husband, Christian Richard, and their son, Christian Georges Dumontet, in this idyllic world that she manifested. Naturally, we know all about it thanks to her leading role on Netflix's "Selling Sunset." The fashion icon is renowned for her entertaining role as the show's ice queen, a Gothic princess who doesn't bite her tongue. 

Does Quinn mind being the baddie? Absolutely not. On the red carpet of the People's Choice Awards in 2021, E! News correspondent Laverne Cox joked that the star carries the show, thanks to the never ending drama. "Yeah, I live for it," she replied. "I love being the villain and I wouldn't have it any other way." So no complaints from that department.

The star may rock a yellow Lamborghini and a small chair as a purse accessory, but it hasn't been all sparkles and couture since the beginning for this agent. While she might excel at playing the wicked witch of real estate on reality television, she appears to be anything but that in real life. As tragic details about Quinn prove, she had some tough moments as a kid and faced some stressful periods as an adult, too.

Christine Quinn ended up attending an alternative high school after her mother tried to homeschool her. On "Call Her Daddy," she reflected that the school felt like a punishment. On reflection, she realized it was a blessing because she got to hang out with kids who moved to the beat of their own drums. Some students also faced serious challenges including being sex trafficked and selling drugs. Quinn said that the unconventional experience taught her to be savvier. "It's something that shaped me because now I have the hustle," she said. "Now I have the street smarts." 

But it wasn't all great. Quinn wound up getting arrested. "One day someone gave me a little birthday surprise, and it happened to be marijuana," she told People. "Another kid saw them give it to me, and I got called into the principal's office and the principal had a choice. She said, 'I'm going to think about whether I'm going to suspend you or call the police right now.' And she chose to call the police." Quinn said that she got handcuffed and sent to jail on her birthday. Her parents didn't bail her out for four days in the hopes that the experience would make an impact. It certainly did. "It made me really think, like, okay — one screw up, one little mess really can turn my life around. It certainly put me in check at a really young age," she said.

Speaking to Page Six, Christine Quinn revealed that her mom's health issues have included a double mastectomy, Lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, and Raynaud's phenomenon, where blood flow to appendages can be severely restricted or interrupted altogether. The star added that her mother has low mobility and limited movement in her hands. Per the outlet, in July 2020, Christine Quinn's mother also suffered a heart attack in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.

Quinn said that right before her wedding to Christian Richard, her mother had to have heart surgery. According to People, the couple married in December 2019, in a ceremony that was featured on "Selling Sunset" and did not disappoint. "We wanted to get married in December to start off the New Year [as husband and wife]," Quinn told People. "And a winter wonderland theme with a wicked twist is memorable forever." Unfortunately, her mother's illness was a tough moment for such a happy time.

So when Quinn's mother suffered a heart attack months later, the reality star told Page Six how challenging it was with the added restrictions during the pandemic. "It's just really hard because no one is allowed to visit," she said. "My dad and my sister can't even visit ... they won't let anyone in." As the realtor told The Times, doctors had warned Quinn and her family that her mom wasn't going to make it. "We were saying goodbye to her," she said, "... But she made it through."

Despite her eclectic education, or perhaps because of it, Christine Quinn never graduated high school. She kept this a secret until her interview with Vogue in 2020, when she finally aired her secret. "I'm really insecure about it," Quinn said. "The reason I'm sharing this now is that I want people to know that there are people out there who can't afford education or who, like me, weren't able to finish school." 

She went on to say that she wanted to speak up so that people don't fall prey to the faulty thinking that the only way one can achieve is through education. "We should take the pressure off young people and those who can't get an education—for whatever reason—and tell them, 'Hey, it will be okay. You don't have to follow the same path as everyone else," she said. "There are always other options."

On "Call Her Daddy," Quinn spoke about how pivotal the Vogue interview was, explaining that authenticity is what's most important to her. So when the interviewer was praising Quinn for her many successes, she said she felt like she was living a lie. "The emotions just started flooding out of me," she said and shared that she started crying during the interview. What previously had only been known by her family and her husband became public knowledge. "I have an eighth-grade education," she admitted. Quinn doesn't have a GED but she has still created the life of her dreams.

Christine Quinn might not mind being the villain of "Selling Sunset," but she regardless seemed to find the role limiting. On "Call Her Daddy," Quinn said that production pitched the show as a group of close-knit women working in real estate. Of course, it didn't quite turn out that way. While she understood that she was depicting a character, the star said of herself, "There [are] definitely two sides of Christine for sure. There's the one you see on TV and there's the one right now." However, she claimed that other cast members weren't always able to disconnect from their persona after a scene.

Quinn admitted that production told her that she would be the villain, to which she agreed. However, the star claimed that production took it a step further, altering and manipulating storylines to amp up the tension. "I'm being myself," she promised. "I have fun with it. I say the things I normally would in real life. I am funny and silly and goofy but you only see a small percentage of that because villains can't be relatable." She said that a lot of who she is winds up on the editing room floor.

Speaking to Variety, executive producer Adam DiVello suggested his production team is drawn to authenticity. "[T]he ones we gravitate toward are the ones being themselves," he said of who he chooses for reality TV. "If I feel like someone is being artificial we steer clear of them."

A major theme in Christine Quinn's narrative during later seasons of "Selling Sunset" was her feud with Emma Hernan and their diverging stories about what happened with a man they both previously dated, Peter Cornell. Quinn said that the experience of catching Cornell with Hernan was one of the most horrifying experiences of her life when she dished on "Call Her Daddy."

The star explained that her then-beau had left in the morning, claiming he had to meet his gardeners. When she was out later, catching up with a friend, she spotted him holding hands with Hernan. "I was in complete shock," she said. Quinn admitted that she approached her "Selling Sunset" co-star at the time and told her to get in touch for receipts that she and Cornell had been dating. The "How to Be as Boss B*tch" author further suggested her biggest beef was that Hernan acted as if she had never heard of Quinn when she joined the cast of "Selling Sunset." 

Meanwhile, Hernan still holds her ground that despite Quinn's insistence that it happened, there was no engagement between Cornell and her co-star. The empanada entrepreneur told ET that she told Cornell about this alleged engagement. "It was mind-blowing to him," she said. Despite being close friends, Hernan also denied rumors that she and Cornell got back together. She accused Quinn of being behind the gossip, accusing her of taking pictures of the two and selling them to tabloids.