Twenty years of marriage, four kids, two prison sentences and one looming deportation later,TeresaandJoe Giudicehave split.
TheReal Housewives of New Jerseystars “have been separated,” a source close to the family tells PEOPLE exclusively.
Steve Mack/FilmMagic
Still, the source says “there are no plans for divorce” at this time, adding that “both of them are focused” on their four daughters: Gia, 18, Gabriella, 15, Milania, 14, and Audriana, 10.
The source says the girls will be visiting Joe for Christmas in Italy, while Teresa is staying home in New Jersey with her father.
PEOPLE reached out to Teresa’s lawyer James J. Leonard for comment, and he politely declined.
Teresa, 47, and Joe, 49, were childhood sweethearts and got married in October 1999. They have been living apart for nearly four years. Joe began a 41-month prison sentence for mail, wire and bankruptcy fraud in March 2016; Teresa served a little over 11 months in prison for the same crimes, and wasreleasedon Dec. 23, 2015.
Joe wasreleased from prisonlast year but was held in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Clinton County Correctional Center in Pennsylvania as he fought to appeal a judge’s deportation order. (Though he has lived in the United States since he was a child,he never obtained American citizenship.)
Due to the rough conditions inside the ICE facility, though, Joerequested to go to Italyto await his third and final deportation appeal. He flew to Europe in October, where he’s currently awaiting the final decision in his deportation battle. Teresa previously told PEOPLE the family understood why he chose to leave the United States after seven trying months in ICE custody.
Teresa Giudice, Joe Giudice and their daughters.Joe Giudice/ Instagram
“At the end of the day, I just want Joe to be happy. I’m just happy that he was free. I mean, where he was, it was really torturous,” she said, adding, “I mean, he did wait [to leave America] because that’s what his daughters wanted him to do, fight. And that’s I what I said to him, you can never regret it because you did fight, and now that was good that you were able to leave and still fight it from Italy. I was like, ‘You don’t want to be in there. It’s disgusting.’ Who would want to be in there?”
“So, I mean, he kept saying, ‘I wish I would have left earlier and I didn’t have to spend those seven months in there and then I could have saw the girls in the summertime.’ I’m like ‘Whatever.’ I mean because you always follow the lead of the lawyers, what they tell you to do,” she added. “You can’t think about ‘I should have, could have,’ whatever. This is the way it was supposed to go. … His daughters could never say Daddy didn’t fight.”
In October, shortly before theGiudice family trip to Italy, Joe appeared in his first television interview since he went to prison in March 2016, chatting via satellite with Teresa in aWatch What Happens Live with Andy Cohenspecial.
The Giudice family.Gia Giudice/Instagram
During the interview, Teresa and Joe toldAndy Cohenthat they’re at a crossroads with their marriage and would not be making any decisions until they spent some time together in person.
“I’m waiting until I get there to see if I feel differently,” Teresa said. “I just feel like when you live apart. … He says the same thing, when he sees me, he may not want this either. We’ll know when we see each other.”
Although they both maintained that they still love each other, Teresa again said she would have no choice but to divorce Joe if he is indeed deported.
“I want to wake up with someone every single day,” Teresa said, explaining that her kids understood. “I think they get it. I don’t think they want to see it happen, obviously, but I think they understand. Because the way I explained it to them, how are we going to live apart? I don’t think he would be faithful. I think he would have someone there and have me here. I just don’t want to live that life.”
“People think that I’d never leave Joe. But that’s not the case,” she wrote.“If things with Joe aren’t good … between us when he gets home, I’d absolutely end our relationship.”
Natalie Stone
source: people.com
