If you thought Noella Bergener couldn’t shock Bravo fans anymore – think again!
During part one of the season 16 reunion, the Real Housewives of Orange County newbie revealed she met her ex-husband, James Bergener, on the website Seeking Arrangement.
“I thought, forgive me, [Seeking Arrangement was] for more of a sugar daddy kind of thing,” reunion host Andy Cohen commented. He then asked Noella if she married James just for his money.
“I mean, there are attractive girls, and wealthy men are the standard,” Noella said. She claimed that money wasn’t her focus when she met James.
“I wanted to build a family and love this man,” she said.
Andy decided to dig a little deeper and asked Noella to clarify her and James’ relationship timeline.
“We were five years and then one legal year of marriage,” she said. “He was separated when I met him, and so once we realized that we could have children and I could start IVF, it was important for me to do the gathering of our family and do the picture of me in the white dress. So we had a wedding ceremony, knowing that it wasn’t fully legal.”
“I didn’t care about the actual piece of paper for a divorce. Anybody who’s out there said I cared about money or gold-digging kind of thing,” she said.
Noella also claimed that she would have quit RHOC to save her marriage to James. Most of Noella’s c0-stars didn’t buy her story, with Andy noting she had been vying to get on the show for years.
Gina Kirschenheirter suggested that she believes James was supportive of Noella joining RHOC until his tax liens became public knowledge. After that, he wanted her off the show, and she refused, so they split. It was also revealed that Noella reportedly filed for separation from James first, with some suggesting that Noella really wasn’t blindsided by their split.
On the other hand, Emily Simpson noted that Noella and James were residents of Puerto Rico and rented their Orange County mansion for filming RHOC.
Part 2 of the Real Housewives of Orange County reunion airs Wednesday, April 27, at 9 est on Bravo.
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