'Vanderpump Rules' star Raquel Leviss checks into mental health treatment facility amid Scandoval drama
Raquel Leviss — the Vanderpump Rules personality, whose affair with co-star Tom Sandoval has been splashed all over the internet for the last month — has checked into a mental health treatment facility.
"Raquel and her family decided before the relationship was discovered that she would enter a voluntary facility for mental health counseling," a rep for the Bravo personality said in a statement obtained by multiple news outlets. "She was scheduled to go in pre-reunion," which taped on March 23, "but decided she wanted to finish her filming commitment. Bravo and production were aware and in support of her journey towards better mental health."
The rep added that Leviss is not in rehab for substance abuse issues but in a program focused on "mental health and trauma therapy."
Leviss's spokesperson has not yet responded to Yahoo Entertainment's request for comment.
In early March, it was revealed that Leviss and Sandoval carried on a months-long affair while he was in a nine-year relationship with Ariana Madix. Madix uncovered the relationship after seeing a sexually explicit video of Leviss on Sandoval's phone and scrolling through their chat history. Madix broke up with the TomTom bar owner and musician.
Both Leviss and Sandoval apologized for their roles in the cheating scandal. For her part, Leviss apologized "for my actions and my choices foremost to Ariana, and to my friends and the fans so invested in our relationships. There is no excuse, I am not a victim and I must own my actions and I deeply regret hurting Ariana."
Leviss went on to reveal that she had been in counseling learning about her "patterns of codependency and addiction to being and feeling loved." She said she was hopeful therapy would help to end her "unhealthy behavioral cycle" and vowed to make it a priority to "protect" her mental health and "learn" from these mistakes.
Earlier this week, Sandoval gave his first interview amid the scandal dubbed "Scandoval" on the Howie Mandel Does Stuff podcast. In it, he detailed his first kiss with the SUR server — last year in the backyard of the home he shared with Madix.
"We just kissed," he said. "It was magnetic. We were talking, moving closer, and as we were talking, as time went on, we would just start talking closer and closer, and then all of a sudden, we’re kissing."
Of the spark, he said, I felt something that I hadn’t felt in so long, like, emotionally." He went on to call Leviss "awesome," kind," "smart," witty," fun," "beautiful" and "f***ing amazing."
He also said that before things took a romantic turn, Leviss was "a source of strength" for him as he navigated his allegedly unhappy and unhealthy relationship with Madix.
