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The Real Housewives of New Jersey’s Luis “Louie” Ruelas’ ex-fiancée, Vanessa Reiser, wrote the book Narcissistic Abuse: A Therapist’s Guide to Identifying, Escaping, and Healing From Toxic and Manipulative People, and she exclusively tells In Touch why she didn’t mention her ex by name in the project.
“The book is really bigger than any of my experiences. It’s a lot of compiling of data regarding my clients, a lot of evidence-based articles that I’ve read a ton of information on cults and domestic violence,” Vanessa explains to In Touch. “So, it’s really not a memoir. It’s not about me.”
Vanessa, who dated Luis, 49, between 2018 and 2020, tells In Touch that she didn’t contact the reality star before or after writing her book because “it has nothing to do with him.”
Luis started dating wife Teresa Giudice in 2020, months after his split with Vanessa.
During RHONJ season 14, Vanessa unintentionally became the storyline that divided the cast after she was contacted by Teresa’s costars Jackie Goldschneider and Margaret Josephs. Throughout the season, Teresa, 52, teased that she knew something about Margaret, 57, and later revealed that she contacted Vanessa. Teresa wasn’t happy with the situation. Once the season finale rolled around, Margaret revealed that Jackie, 48, contacted Vanessa to blackmail Teresa. When Jackie admitted to meeting with Vanessa, Teresa didn’t come off as as angry as she was toward Margaret.
That said, Vanessa confirms Margaret’s story about their connection to In Touch.
“It was all after Bo Dietl put two fake clients in my practice who were pretending to be the victims of domestic violence that we began to connect,” Vanessa says, sharing that they are more like distant acquaintances who exchange nothing “other than niceties.”
Meanwhile, Bo exclusively told In Touch, “We were hired to do a confidential investigation into the ex-girlfriend, and all of a sudden Luis says on the show that he hired Bo Dietl to investigate, and this becomes a narrative. We told Andy Cohen we were never hired to look into the cast. We were never hired by Luis or any other cast member to do a background check on any Real Housewives. We adhere to the most rigorous legal standards in our investigation. We maintain confidentiality regarding our cases, and we do not comment on specific investigations.”
Vanessa tells In Touch that she decided to write the book after she “noticed that there was a disconnect between people who had gone through narcissistic abuse and those that have extricated themselves from cults.”
“The book is designed specifically to fuse the concepts of narcissistic abuse and cult abuse,” the therapist explains.
Vanessa and Luis didn’t end their relationship amicably, and they found themselves in a legal battle in 2023 after she filed a restraining order against Luis for alleged stalking. Vanessa made the filing after she took on a new client who went by a fake name and asked specific questions about the author’s relationship with Luis.
“It was weird that she kept asking all of this information that if Luis ever left his wife and he was unhappy, would she ever take him back,” Vanessa’s lawyer, Douglas Anton, told Page Six in June 2023, noting that Vanessa would “steer away from the subject and not so much talk about it.”
The restraining order was denied that October.
“The court not only dismissed Ms. Reiser’s complaint and denied her application for a permanent restraining order, but also found that she was ‘obsessed’ with Mr. Ruelas, continuously bothering he and his family,” Luis’ attorney, Marco Laracca, told Page Six at the time.
Meanwhile, Vanessa’s lawyer told the outlet, “Indeed, for her protection, we were ‘obsessed’ with proving Luis did this invasive thing, so that he never does it again. Vanessa feels completely vindicated and now protected by having outing him for this offensive conduct.”
English (US) ·