Tamra Judge offered an update on her relationship with her oldest daughter, Sidney Barney, and took aim at her ex-husband, Simon Barney, during the latest episode of Nick Viall‘s podcast on Tuesday.
As she also spoke of Sidney’s relationships with her younger kids, Spencer Barney and Sophia Barney, reflected on her most recent falling out with Shannon Beador, 61, and reacted to Gretchen Rossi‘s reveal of having injured Slade Smiley‘s penis, the 57-year-old Real Housewives of Orange County star called Gretchen, 46, out for betraying her former friend, Jo De La Rosa, 44.
“I don’t like to get into it too much just because [Sidney] doesn’t like to be talked about in a public manner, but when we went through our divorce, there was a lot of manipulation going on on one side,” Tamra revealed of her strained relationship with Sidney on the August 6 episode of The Viall Files.
As Tamra explained, she and Sidney never had a bad relationship. However, after she and Simon split, Sidney chose to live with her dad, as Spencer and Sophia remained with their mom.
“[Spencer and Sophia] don’t have a relationship with their dad. [Sophia] hasn’t had a relationship with him in five years. It’s a terrible situation,” Tamra admitted. “I feel bad for him just like I feel bad for myself in a sense. It’s not a situation that anyone wants to be in.”
“Don’t marry a narcissist. That’s all I can say. That’s my advice to people,” she continued. “Parental alienation is a thing, and is a big thing. When people get divorced, sometimes there is one parent that just, they hate you more than they love your kids … so basically they trash-talk the other parent and say horrible things, horrible things that aren’t even true, and that kid will take a side. And that’s kind of what happened. He tried to do that with all the kids, and the other two kids went, ‘I ain’t putting up with this anymore. I’m not doing this.’”
While Tamra admitted that she and Sidney are still “not super close,” she insisted that Sidney doesn’t “[hate]” her and confirmed they recently spent time together.
“I saw Sidney. She came to the house not too long ago, and we hugged and talked,” she shared. “Would I do anything to have her back in my life? Absolutely. But I take what I can get, and I cherish those moments that I do have with her.”
As for her relationships with Spencer and Sophia, Tamra said they are “super close,” noting that she talks to Spencer, who is in college, every day, and adding that Sophia still lives at home.
Tamra also stated that Sophia is still in touch with Sidney.
“Sophia’s with me today because she’s gonna go see her sister in L.A.,” she revealed.
Moving on to RHOC topics, Tamra said that while she “absolutely” had compassion for the strain Shannon was under when Alexis Bellino, 48, was added to the cast, it was around that time when things between them took a turn for the worse.
“That’s kind of when things got really bad because people were like, ‘Oh my god, she’s ditching Shannon for Alexis.’ [But that was] not the case at all, whatsoever,” Tamra said, insisting that Alexis began dating Shannon’s ex-boyfriend, John Janssen, 62, after producers approached her.
“I don’t see John [as a Housewives chaser]. I think what people don’t understand is, John was a single dad that raised all his kids by himself. John is like a really nice guy. I like John, I do. [But] Shannon has an MO of, when she’s done with somebody, she wants to destroy their image, and she tries to do that to me,” Tamra explained. “[And] I’m the easiest friend.”
While Shannon has insisted that she’s changed since getting a DUI in September 2023, Tamra wasn’t so sure.
“I don’t know. I hope so. I don’t spend much time with Shannon … [But] she’s the only person I know that can be accused of drinking too much for 10 years, drive her car into a house, try to take off, and have a physical altercation with her boyfriend, and get praised …. And still [be] drinking!” Tamra complained.
“She’s also had a history of not being a great friend to me. When I got fired, she cut me off, ghosted me. And so when I got back on the show, she quickly became my friend again,” Tamra went on.
Also on the podcast, after mocking Gretchen’s faith, joking that it was “very Christian-like of her” to discuss Slade’s penis on camera, and saying that Gretchen betrayed Jo by dating Slade, 51, because “they used to double date,” Tamra said she and Gretchen weren’t always on the outs.
According to Tamra, she thought Gretchen’s relationship with her much-older late ex-fiance, Jeff Beitzel, was “weird” when they first met. But it wasn’t until she learned of Gretchen’s alleged relationships with other men that she took issue with her castmate.
“She was just so easy to poke fun of. She’s not the brightest girl in the world, and she does stupid things … and then me and Jeana and Vicki walk into a bar … and she’s sitting on this guy’s lap, no engagement ring on …. There started to be all these inconsistencies in her stories and lies,” she recalled.
“Then a year or two later she starts dating Slade and we’re like, ‘Okay, well, everybody’s lost respect for you now,’” she added.
The Real Housewives of Orange County season 19 airs Thursdays at 9/8c on Bravo.
