Yahoo News Tom Sandoval 'Got My Ass Into Therapy Immediately' After First Time Cheating with Raquel Leviss
The Vanderpump Rules star said he took himself to therapy to "try and figure out what the hell I'm gonna do" and also went to couple's therapy with now ex-girlfriend Ariana Madix
Tom Sandoval has revealed he took himself to therapy "immediately" after he first cheated on Ariana Madix with their Vanderpump Rules costar Raquel Leviss.
On the latest episode of Howie Mandel Does Stuff podcast, Sandoval, 40, said the pair first kissed at the house he shared with Madix in the summer of 2022, before their costars Scheana Shay and Brock Davies' August wedding.
"After Raquel and I kissed and I felt this way or whatever, I got my ass into therapy immediately to try and figure out what the hell I'm gonna do," he told hosts Howie Mandel and his daughter Jackelyn Shultz.
"The feelings were something very, very strong. Those feelings that I had started to kind of like take over, in a sense. Logic all that s--- went out the window. Because I wasn't experiencing that [with Ariana] — I hadn't experienced that."
Detailing their first kiss, Sandoval described it as "magnetic."
"I felt something that I hadn't felt in so long, emotionally," he said, adding that "all I could focus on" was being in communication with Leviss.
Sandoval also touched on his best friend and business partner Tom Schwartz's comments that Raquel "was almost like a drug to him." — saying, "It kind of became that way later on."
"Our relationship, our connection was healthy, but the environment it created — the lying, sneaking around —was very unhealthy," Sandoval told Mandel and his daughter. "But time was always fleeting and every time we were around each other it felt like it could be the last time we see each other so it made us both obsessive over trying to see each other."
He went on to confirm that Schwartz, 40, did not know that he had already locked lips with Leviss when he kissed her during Shay and Davies' wedding celebrations in Mexico. The smooch made Sandoval "a little jealous," he admitted.
Sandoval wasn't the only one who went to therapy. He said on the podcast that he and Madix went to couple's therapy to try and work on their issues and try and stop "repeating" what had happened with Leviss.
"I got Ariana and I into couple's therapy," he said. "I'd been in therapy for a couple of months. I already knew in my heart that this wasn't right and we both deserved better in a sense. And we both deserved to be happy and have our needs met. I didn't tell this to Ariana, I didn't disclose this, because to her and to us, we had planned to spend the rest of our lives together, marriage or not. And I knew that this would be a very hard thing for her to accept, it was a very hard thing for me to accept."
The reality star noted he started "planting the seed" that he was having doubts about their relationship during their therapy sessions. "I wanted to be there with a therapist because in the past when I tried to bring things up with Ariana she shuts it down and metaphorically flips the Monopoly board and walks away," he said.
He continued, "As we kept going, I kept more and more putting it out there, and then towards the later sessions I was going through hypotheticals. 'Hypothetically if we break up, what would you do?' And Ariana too, at this point had got a Coachella house and even after our first session, she was like, 'It's a lot of money if you want to break up with me.' "
Sandoval claimed that Madix was aware he was spending time with Leviss but was ignoring what was going on. "She had heard things and seen things about Raquel but was very much turning a blind eye and or just trusting me I guess," he said.
The Schwartz and Sandy's co-owner also discussed the "distance" between himself and Madix and claimed the pair were living "separate lives" towards the end of their nine-year relationship. He then revealed he and Leviss were seeing each other as often as they could towards the end of his relationship, but claimed Madix "didn't notice."
RELATED VIDEO: Vanderpump Rules: Ariana Madix Confronts 'Stranger' Tom Sandoval After Split and Says She Wants Him 'to Die'
Elsewhere during his bombshell podcast appearance, Sandoval claimed that he split from Madix two weeks before his affair with Leviss was made public on March 3.
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PEOPLE confirmed the end of Sandoval and Madix's nine-year relationship in March. At the time, a source said the pair "had been having problems for a while" but his months-long affair with Leviss was "the final straw" for Madix.
"She put up with a lot over the years, but she won't sit back and be disrespected this way," the insider added.
Vanderpump Rules airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET on Bravo.
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