MatildaMoody

I don't think he is faking. I don't think he is dumb enough to try it. Consider all of the stuff that has come out about him before he even appeared on the show? No way he would ruin his Sugar Mama's income stream by risking it.

I disagree based on the fact that she didn't want to film with Brooks this season and Andy threatened to fire her if she didn't. Obviously, Vicki felt she had plenty going on that didn't involve Brooks. There would be no need to be involved in a fake Cancer story line with him if she never planned to film with him to begin with and only filmed with him because she would be fired if she didn't.

The thing that bothered me about the "Bitter old woman" thing is that at age 30 Mehgan considers 53 to be old. Vicki is absolutely bitter. But she is far from old. And it isn't even about age shaming for me. It is the fact that it is not factual that bothers me the most. When I was 30 I considered 70 to be old. Now at 40, I still consider 70 to be old. I would have never called anyone in their 50's old when I was Mehgan's age and I guess it just bugs because she was so gleeful about it. Plus, I really don't like Mehgan. I find her disingenuous and insufferably obnoxious. She is trying way too hard and it bugs me.

I think in the normal realm of "crazy shit women do when cheated on" the mistress only wins if the husband leaves the wife for the mistress. But, in Shannon's case, I think that it wouldn't matter if David left her for the other woman or if he just left her. If David left, the mistress would still win because in Shannon's mind it is the affair that caused David to leave. I feel like Shannon needs to have David grovel and if she decides to leave him, she wins. But if he stays, she also wins because she is showing the mistress that the affair meant nothing compared to the marriage. Plus, she has the added bonus of making him pay for the affair every time she has a negative thought.

For me, the crux of it is that Vicki didn't opt to make this her primary story line, BRAVO did. She agreed to film with Brooks because he was living with her. But, everything that they have done, the vagueness the not going into detail, shows me that they never wanted this to be the primary story line for them. I'm pretty sure that Vicki was hoping her story line would follow her life with the other women, her long distance relationship with Brianna and her ongoing friendship with Shannon. Vicki had a great year last season. She came across well. She supported Shannon against the crazy that was Heather and Tamra. She tried to get Tamra to see reason. The only thing she wanted was for the women to support her decision to continue seeing Brooks and to not speculate on that relationship. So, I wasn't the least bit surprised when she didn't want Brooks to be involved in her story this year. But, Andy threatened to fire her if she didn't include Brooks. Brooks having cancer just happens to be a part of their reality. But, it isn't something they have been trying to put out there as story fodder, certainly not something to be speculated on. I think BRAVO saw that first phone call between Tamra and and Vicki where Eddie coughs "bullshit" and ran with it. Obviously, Tamra had been feeding speculation that Brooks was somehow lying about it. I think about how Brianna had her cancer scare and Vicki made it all about her. Aside from a couple of conversations with Brianna, it wasn't Vicki's focal story. I suspect she figured the same thing would happen with Brooks. But, Tamra had been feeding this whole "Brooks is faking cancer" thing since before filming began and BRAVO couldn't resist their number one shit stirrer. No one was asking Vicki to "prove" that Brianna had tumors on her thyroid. No one was questioning Brianna about her treatment, they either said the supportive words or made it about them (Gretchen crying over Jeff).

If Shannon divorces David, the mistress wins. Plus, David will have a shot at being happy, and there is no way she wants that after being cheated on. The thing is she doesn't realize that she is making her children suffer in order punish David and keep the mistress from winning.

i think it was more along the lines of Brooks convinced Vicki that he needed her to take him in. Weren't they off again when his diagnoses was initially made public? Then Vicki wanted to be supportive and they were on again? But, Vicki didn't want any of the Brooks stuff to be filmed, so I doubt Brooks convinced her it would be a good story line. I'm sure at that point prior to filming, Brooks was getting tired of all of the hate being aimed at him and would have gladly sat out filming while enjoying Vicki's home and money.

I'm kind of of two minds with this. Yes Vicki is a hypocrite, it is part of what makes her so good for reality television. But, I also see the difference between Vicki using a medium for comfort and Mehgan using a psychic as proof. Vicki knew that what the medium told her was solely to make her and her brother Billy feel better about their mom's passing. It gave her comfort to know that her mom was ok wherever she was and that she was still looking out for them. Mehgan just kind of took a vague statement by a psychic and used it as proof that Brookes was faking cancer on national television. That would be enough to piss anyone off, let alone a woman like Vicki who knows exactly how reality tv works and how damaging something like that could be. ETA: Regarding Shannon and David. My husband asks me what i would like to do for my birthday each year so that there is no chance of disappointing me. So, I don't fully understand the mindset of Shannon's not telling David what she wants from him, but then telling us the audience what she expected and how disappointed she is with what she got.

This really reminds me of her being so upset last season because David had never planned a vacation for the two of them before. Shannon seems to have a very difficult time expressing her expectations. It's like she expects David to read her mind about what she actually wants and then she is disappointed when he isn't able to. It doesn't help that he is also completely checked out. I suspect he was checked out long before the affair. I think it was really a matter of them immediately having children after getting married. They never really got the chance to get to know each other well enough to know what makes the other happy. So they have just been drifting along with Shannon having these expectations that aren't being met and David looking for happiness outside of the marriage in order to deal with constantly disappointing his wife.

That would definitely explain why she came so hard for Brandi of BH before remembering that she was now a Christian and talked about how much she loved Brandi. I love Shannon. I think that she has been a really good addition to the show in a lot of ways (not in every way because she really needs some discretion when it comes to her kids). But, I also think that she has a tendency towards exaggeration. I suspect that she asked David if he saw his mistress on her 50th birthday and he said yes. I think the rest of it, that they were intimate and then David was intimate with his mistress were literal in some sense. Obviously the sex was an issue since affairs are gross. But, I think that Shannon is more undone by the fact that David shared actual intimacy with the woman on her birthday (even if it wasn't sexual that night), and Shannon felt like her birthday was a truly intimate moment even if she and David hadn't had sex that night - although if there was vodka involved, who knows? Shannon seems to me to be the type to dwell on every time David even saw the mistress, regardless of whether they had sex at the time. And each time she demands and receives an answer about when the two last saw each other, or she assumes they last saw each other, it becomes cheating all over again. I think that is why she freaked out when David was so vague about seeing that "friend" of hers on the beach. I also think that is why she should simply divorce him and move on with her life. But, if she does, the mistress "wins."

I think this pretty much sums up why Shannon does not like to let the girls sleep over at friends' houses. Obviously, their friends's parents are as invested in a toxic free environment with hospital great air circulation. Too bad Mehgan wouldn't get the joke. If she is "too young" to know who Tommy Lee and Richie Sambora are, no way she will get an old SNL reference. Also, for those who were wondering, OG means Original Gangsta. It is 25 year old slang term used a great deal in early and even current hip hop music. There was even a movie in early to mid 90's starring Pam Greer and other blaxploitation alum by the same name.

I'm not so sure i agree. Mehgan seems to target Shannon a lot for no real reason, that leads me to believe she is a bit of a bully. I definitely don't think she is naive so much as she wants us to believe she is. She seems to be trying to build this persona of the "spunky innocent being thrown to the wolves." But we all know this is not her first rodeo. She has two reality shows under her belt, and i would bet my right arm that she studied this show for a while before being cast on it. I think a large reason that she is so disliked by viewers is that we can see through her act. I really suspect she thought that she would come out a fan favorite by playing the "new young innocent wife who isn't afraid to speak her mind." She is disingenuous and audiences hate that.

Because the baby is Tamra's story line and she was pissed that the attention was not on her?

Regarding Brooks, I think it really doesn't matter if he actually has cancer at this point. I think he could publish his medical records and people would still say he is faking it. They would claim that he forged them or somehow falsified them. He could give his doctor permission to publicly state the status of his illness and treatments and people would accuse him of paying the guy off to lie. There is really nothing he can do that is going to make a certain group of people believe he is sick, so I get why he doesn't engage in the conversations/interrogations about his condition and treatment.

One thing that I have always thought about both Vicki and Tamra is that they don't have any real experience with female friendships. I think they have always seen other women as either competition or someone people to be pitied. So when they come together, they realize they can't really compete with each other unless it is about who has had the most failed relationships with both men and their own children. So, for them, the relationship they have is what real friendship looks like because they don't know anything else. I mean Jeana and Vicki were friends for how long? But, that was all just the surface. In actuality, Vicki always felt she was in a competition with Jeanna and when Jeanna left the show, Vicki felt like she won. So of course Vicki is always going to go back to being friends with Tamra and Tamra is always going to go back to being friends with Vicki. They need each other on the show for one. And for another reason, it hasn't occurred to either of them that friends don't treat each other the way that they do.

I'm not seeing any suggestion that he felt forced, only that he felt bad after it was done and he saw the final product. Feeling bad and expressing it, to me, suggests that he is owning it and is sorry for it.

From Vicki's Blog: Well, I totally get why he would feel that way. I mean Tamra and Meh-gan in the same room? gross!

This is so funny. Early in the last season, I kept hoping that Heather would wise up and team up with Shannon to take Tamra down. Both of them had been done dirty by Tamra, but both of them were too focused on their own feud to see it and just take the bitch down.

I don't know. I read a producer's blog on BRAVO that talked about how Luann got outed during PirateGate. Heather and Carole had no intention of mentioning it on camera. They weren't mic'ed and were away from the camera while talking about it but they were overheard by a production assistant. Production then told both of them that they needed to bring it to camera. That's why we got the talking heads of them talking about hearing a bunch of men's voices and one of them being Luann's. Producers have a way of convincing the people to do things that they wouldn't normally do in a real life situation. Hell, Vicki didn't even want Brooks to be filmed this season, and now we are subjected to this does he or doesn't he have cancer story line because Andy threatened to fire her if he didn't film. Which actually makes me wonder if Andy would have fired her if Brooks had refused to sign the consent to film. Probably.

Medical records are private, and I can't see any ethical doctor allowing patient confidentiality to be compromised by appearing on camera during treatment. Any time I have ever seen a doctor/therapist/counselor willing to appear on a show like this, I instantly doubt their ethics and question whether or not they are a fame whore themselves.

It reminds me of that Family Guy episode, where Stewie and Bryan think it would be fun to make up a rumor about someone. So Stewie says I hear Rob Schneider likes to pick up day laborers at Home Depot and then bring them home to strangle them in the shower. And the joke is that it totally sounds like something Rob Schneider might do and could probably go really far as a rumor. I think it is possible that something similar happened here. She, like so many others in Shannon and David's/Heather and Terry's social circle meet the criteria based on whatever gossip is already out there. So it could just as easily be her as anyone else. But, unless one of the members of the HW cast has the balls to confirm it and out her on television, we will never know for sure. Or, unless she confirms it herself, we will never know for sure.

I honestly have no clue. My interactions with her were on the phone for business purposes (I am on the east coast and work for an international company) and it never would have occurred to me to think she was involved in any of this until I kept seeing her name pop up by an anonymous commenter. Also, considering how many blond upwardly mobile women live in that area and interact in that social circle, it's anyone's guess as to whether it is really her or if someone just put the clues together and came up with a rumor because it sounded feasible.

Shannon shared that information with Tamra shortly after meeting her and was shocked when Tamra shared it with Heather. I think Shannon is just way too candid when it comes to things most people would consider personal information.

I've spoken to her exactly 2 times and never about anything personal. So, I doubt she would volunteer any information in either direction, at least not to me.

Yes. I did. I didn't know she was the one being accused of having an affair with David. I just knew who she was because my company had done business with her company.