Read Online Turning the Tables: From Housewife to Inmate and Back Again by Teresa Giudice, K.C. Baker - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Teresa Giudice, K.C. Baker
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perfect and I fell in love the minute I saw her!), both my mom and Joe’s mom warned me about the malocchio —the evil eye (pronounced maloik ). They had talked about it all the time, but now that I had her, they were afraid someone could do it to her. When I was a teenager, I used to get the worst headaches. My mom took me to see this old lady she knew to find out if the headaches were caused by the malocchio . I watched as she put drops of olive oil in a bowl of water. If the drops got big, that meant someone had given you the malocchio and she would say prayers to break it. It worked. My headaches went away. I remember the lady would yawn from saying the prayers, which meant the malocchio was gone. The bigger and longer the yawn, the worse the malocchio was. The lady yawned for a long time, which meant mine was very bad.
My family took the malocchio seriously. When I was growing up, my mom and dad told me that it could actually kill you. To protect myself from people I felt were giving me the malocchio , my mother would always tell me to make the sign of the horn with my hand: You put up your index finger and pinky while holding your middle and ring fingers with your thumb. I did that when those girls in high school were jealous of me and my crush. Some of them had no idea what I was doing and thought I was weird. That’s why Italians always wear horns around their necks—to ward off someone who looks at them with envy. (Joe wore one when he started doing really well in business later on. It didn’t seem to work, though, given what happened to us. Now he wears a huge horn around his neck that his mother got him in Italy and was blessed by priests.)
My mother-in-law told me that sometimes people can give you the malocchio without even meaning to do it. So I always had Gia wear a fourteen-karat-gold pin with the Italian horn on her little outfits, just in case.
B efore I had Gia, I had planned on going back to work. But I couldn’t bear the thought of being away from her for more than twelve hours a day. I just couldn’t leave her. Joe’s businesses were doing well, so I was lucky enough to be able to stay home and take care of her full-time.
We were still living in Joe’s apartment when we had Gia. We turned the second bedroom I used as my closet into her nursery, so we were pretty cramped in there. We needed to move into a house. When we were dating, we’d bought a piece of property around the corner from where we lived, so we could build on it. But in 2000, a friend of Joe’s showed him a fantastic property in Montville, which is where we live now. As soon as we saw it, we fell in love with it. Even though it already had a 5,500-square-foot house on it, we were going to expand it and make it into our dream house. The yard was huge—and so private.
Since we knew we were going to remodel, we started out with only the furniture from Joe’s apartment so we wouldn’t waste money. It took years—and a lot of hard work, time, and sacrifice—to get the house to look the way it does now. I was happy we moved to a house because our little family expanded quite a bit after Gabriella was born in 2004, followed by Milania sixteen months later in 2006, and then Audriana, in 2009.
We lived in the Montville house for a few years, then moved out for a few years while Joe and some of his construction crew added on to it and changed the roof. We were still finishing our house when I started Real Housewives . The one I had to say goodbye to the night I left for prison. That house is the heart and soul of the family. Joe helped build it with his own two hands. My girls grew up there. We celebrated birthdays and holidays under that roof. It’s where I sang my babies to sleep and snuggled with my husband. Saying goodbye to the home I had known for so many years tore my heart into a million pieces, just like saying goodbye to my husband and daughters did.
I have made a point of teaching all my daughters to be strong,
My family took the malocchio seriously. When I was growing up, my mom and dad told me that it could actually kill you. To protect myself from people I felt were giving me the malocchio , my mother would always tell me to make the sign of the horn with my hand: You put up your index finger and pinky while holding your middle and ring fingers with your thumb. I did that when those girls in high school were jealous of me and my crush. Some of them had no idea what I was doing and thought I was weird. That’s why Italians always wear horns around their necks—to ward off someone who looks at them with envy. (Joe wore one when he started doing really well in business later on. It didn’t seem to work, though, given what happened to us. Now he wears a huge horn around his neck that his mother got him in Italy and was blessed by priests.)
My mother-in-law told me that sometimes people can give you the malocchio without even meaning to do it. So I always had Gia wear a fourteen-karat-gold pin with the Italian horn on her little outfits, just in case.
B efore I had Gia, I had planned on going back to work. But I couldn’t bear the thought of being away from her for more than twelve hours a day. I just couldn’t leave her. Joe’s businesses were doing well, so I was lucky enough to be able to stay home and take care of her full-time.
We were still living in Joe’s apartment when we had Gia. We turned the second bedroom I used as my closet into her nursery, so we were pretty cramped in there. We needed to move into a house. When we were dating, we’d bought a piece of property around the corner from where we lived, so we could build on it. But in 2000, a friend of Joe’s showed him a fantastic property in Montville, which is where we live now. As soon as we saw it, we fell in love with it. Even though it already had a 5,500-square-foot house on it, we were going to expand it and make it into our dream house. The yard was huge—and so private.
Since we knew we were going to remodel, we started out with only the furniture from Joe’s apartment so we wouldn’t waste money. It took years—and a lot of hard work, time, and sacrifice—to get the house to look the way it does now. I was happy we moved to a house because our little family expanded quite a bit after Gabriella was born in 2004, followed by Milania sixteen months later in 2006, and then Audriana, in 2009.
We lived in the Montville house for a few years, then moved out for a few years while Joe and some of his construction crew added on to it and changed the roof. We were still finishing our house when I started Real Housewives . The one I had to say goodbye to the night I left for prison. That house is the heart and soul of the family. Joe helped build it with his own two hands. My girls grew up there. We celebrated birthdays and holidays under that roof. It’s where I sang my babies to sleep and snuggled with my husband. Saying goodbye to the home I had known for so many years tore my heart into a million pieces, just like saying goodbye to my husband and daughters did.
I have made a point of teaching all my daughters to be strong,
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