First, an important glossary:
Trazadone is an SARI antidepressant also used to treat anxiety and insomnia.
Lexipro is an SSRI antidepressant. Pairing it with Trazadone is often done to treat newly sober addicts.
Topamax is a mood stabilizer and anti-convulsant. It’s used to treat epilepsy and can be paired with anti-depressants in the hopes of keeping a patient’s moods from cycling. It can be used to treat depression, seizures, and bipolar disorder, and off-label and investigational uses of Topamax currently include the treatment of alcoholism, OCD, and Borderline Personality Disorder, to name a few. If you are coming off of opiates, you’re at a high risk for suffering seizures, and an anti-convulsant is often prescribed in the detox phase of early sobriety.
Now, what does this have to do with Kim? Well, all of the above medications are currently swirling around her beautiful brain, or were at the time of her visit with Dr. Paul Nassif, a.k.a. Dr./Mr. Maloof. He was hosting a “Beauty Night” at his office, which sounds terrifying. Call me old-fashioned, but I like my medical procedures and treatments to occur while the sun takes its rightful place in the sky.
The point is, nobody needs to worry. Because despite the psychotropic cocktail that Kim is on, it is STILL OKAY FOR HER TO GET HER LIPS DONE. I’ll repeat that. The drugs that Kim Richards was taking — which could have been helping to treat an agitated depression, general anxiety disorder, bipolar or cyclothemia, the residual effects of detox/early sobriety, or none of the above (What am I, a doctor making a recapper’s wage? I’m not going on the record as diagnosing Kim as anything besides gorgeous) — are PERFECTLY SAFE in combination with whatever combination of polymers, numbing agents, and various plumping chemicals Dr. Paul injected into Kim’s lips during his aforementioned night of beauty. SO RELAX. Everything’s fine!
Is everything fine? Well, let me put it this way: There is no drug on the market that you can take in order to cure secrets.
And that was the centerpiece of this week’s episode: finding out what exactly has been eating/fueling Kim (she claims it’s not booze), and leading up to her big reveal to Kyle that … she’s got a boyfriend! With a wedding ring! Whose full name is Ken Blumenfeld! Whom she may or may not have met in AA, based on speculations of yours, dear readers! And whose real-life teenage daughter may or may not be commenting on these very recaps, so forgive me if I don’t compare his likeness to a goblin’s. It’s not a nice thing to do!
Kim’s reveal of Ken to Kyle caused tears and shock and was also compounded with the revelation that Kim is moving in with him, and the whole thing seemed a little canned and phony by the time the shit really hit the fan. But I will say that Kyle, who I suppose met Ken at “Paris’ premiere” (not for her sex tape — I don’t think there was a step and repeat or red carpet for that), did NOT react in a way that indicated any semblance of joy for her sister, for whom she is clearly praying for when she is not boning her good-looking husband and otherwise being occupied with her own fabulousness.
But let’s back up. There was a séance this week, and I don’t want to glaze over the events of the supernatural, LEST I ENRAGE GHOSTS. So let’s start with the events that ensued after Paul’s Beauty Night. Oh, sure, I could go on about how Lisa, during that very Beauty Night, got an e-mail from Russell on her pink leather-ensconced iPad, which claimed (in the booming, denial-fueled cadence of a “Mission Accomplished” banner) that his marriage with Taylor was going gangbusters. But I think Lisa’s conflict with Taylor is so canned and flimsy, it annoys me even to give it recap time. Did or didn’t Lisa plant the story with Us about the Armstrongs’ turmoil? Did or didn’t Lisa claim that Taylor has no friends? Don’t I or don’t I give a fig? (I don’t.)
I know somebody’s got to be the patsy for the fight they’re setting up for next week, in which Taylor confronts the girls about the press about her and her now-dead, then-abusive husband. But I’d rather see Lisa’s screen time devoted to images of her holding up Giggy like he’s the cub at the beginning of Lion King, and footage of her Rich Little–worthy impression of Kim. Anyway, I have a feeling that next week Camille will take the hit for Lisa when Grammer finally shrugs off her Klonopin haze for enough time to confront Taylor about what’s been going on in plain sight between her and Russell. So between now and then, let’s talk about DIFFERENT dead people.
As I mentioned earlier, Kyle had a séance at her house, because apparently, that’s something that’s done. Women in Beverly Hills, if Bravo is to be believed, retain their own personal clairvoyants as well as their own ladysitters, in-home hairstylists, and personal chefs. Fair enough! So, Kyle’s psychic, Rebecca, who seems like a woman with more cats than I’ve ever even thought about, lit candles and filled a glass of water, and by the time everyone had settled into the living room, she was able to summon various spirits to keep the evening lively. Rebecca told Lisa that her grandmother was in the room, and then she communicated with Adrienne’s late father, George; the producers, in a very cute joke, added the kind of chyron that they normally use to indicate minor characters to I.D. each ghost. “Spirit present: George, Adrienne’s father” said the words on the screen. I enjoyed that.
Then, because Rebecca is a clairvoyant and not just a medium, she told Kyle that Kyle was Kim’s mother in a past life. Which set off all kinds of “Eureka” bells in Kyle’s Kyle-fueled mind: Sometimes, Kyle realized out loud with the self-regard of a Winfrey, she acts like Kim’s mother! Yes, we know. Nobody needed to pay a lady with too much faith in magnets to tell Kyle that. And without outright identifying myself as either a devotee of the supernatural or a Penn & Teller–esque skeptic calling bullshit on all of it, I will say that when you’re paying in cash, people tend to tell you exactly what you want to hear. In other words, not a peep emerged from Rebecca’s luxurious maw about how, perhaps, Kyle’s sister may have a secret that’s the source of lots of happiness for her, but misery for Kyle. And how, in fact, Kyle may be approaching her troubled sister’s situation with nothing even close to the kind of selfless compassion or extended understanding that, yes, may not always make her look good or keep her in the center of the spotlight, but is nonetheless necessary in the grand scheme of being close to somebody who is suffering. Maybe Kyle was Kim’s mother once, but I have a feeling she was kind of a crappy mother. Mothers are supposed to be selfless. Even the Duggars know that!
Otherwise, plenty of time was given at the séance to the distinction between Kyle’s psychic and Camille’s psychic, Allison, who was more into e-cigarettes than magnet-readers, and was otherwise responsible for the most memorable episode of last season’s RHOBH. The difference between the two psychics, according to Kyle, is that her psychic “isn’t crazy.” Isn’t that helpful to know? That’s how’s youse can tell ‘em aparts!
Rebecca dropped a couple of other truth bombs that night. Camille was told she’d be meeting a straight guy, instead of Kelsey Grammer who, whether or not he wears women’s clothing, is still the slimiest, lady-chasing d-bag east of Joe Francis. Taylor was told that her husband may have mob ties or be dabbling in otherwise shady business dealings. Brandi, who Kyle invited over without so much as a batted eyelash over their bizarre and hastily orchestrated reconciliation, was told she’d be having another child soon. And it’s unknown whether The Morally Corrupt Faye Resnick, without whom it just wouldn’t be a party at Kyle’s, deferred an incoming message from Spirit Nicole Brown Simpson, who I’m sure is as pissed about the Kardashians’ success as we all are.
Not present at Kyle’s Night of Ghost Beauty was Dana Wilkey (whom I suspect may be getting the Bravo freeze-out, after network peeps did their job and found out that everybody on the web who watches this show wants Dana to disappear/believes that she is horrible) and poor Jerri Kim Blank Richards, who, we later discovered, was prepping at the time for her big move-in with Ken Blumenfeld. And I am going to say this now, not only because I think his daughter might read it: Ken seems like a kind man with a big heart, and good for Kim for finding somebody who loves her and wants to help her take care of herself. Who gives a shit what people say about his looks — including me! You go on, girl. Stay sober, get your meds right, work that overbite, and never, EVER say anything disparaging about gay rights, and there’s nothing you can do to alienate your fans or not succeed during this bizarre third or fourth or perhaps sixth or seventh act of your unique career in the public eye.
And so, there we are, back to where we began. Kyle came over to pretend to be surprised that Kim was moving. And then Kim told her about Ken, and Kyle began to cry. At first she claimed she was crying because Kim was moving “far away,” which is absurd because she’s not moving out of state, and hypocritical because in the past, Kyle had admonished Kim for having the same issue regarding being far apart from her children. And then, we got some insight into why Kyle was really upset.
Kyle is upset because Kim has been keeping a secret boyfriend, and that relationship ostensibly frees Kim from her previously held position under the thumb of a high-achieving sister who thrives on control and attention. The idea of Kim hiding something from Kyle infuriates Kyle because it renders Kim’s decision immune to Kyle’s preapproval. And so Kyle resorts instead to planting “I don’t think this is something you really want to do” thoughts in Kim’s head, as if her sister’s needs (beyond her sobriety and her appearance of functionality and reasonable happiness) have ever affected Kyle as much as her concerns about her own well-being.
And the reason Kim kept Ken from Kyle (oy, I know. Too many Ks, and I’m not even talking about white hoods or those Armenians on E! whom I refuse to discuss again before the week is out) is not only to get the tiny surge of power that’s naturally afforded to those who keep secrets. Kim never told Kyle about Ken because Kim knows that Kyle, in her heart, will never think Ken is good enough for the Richards’ brand. Not that he’s not good enough for Kim! But that he’s not good enough for their family crest. Maybe he’s not handsome or influential or rich; maybe he’s not a former child star, or film producer, or heir, or trader; and maybe he’s somehow otherwise inferior to the multiple beaus her family members have kept company with in the past. Like Rick Salamon, the guy who made that sex tape with Paris and then sold it; or John J. Collett, Kim’s ex-husband, who was murdered by a hit man, in the midst of charges that he and his company may have defrauded investors, in 1991.
My point is not that Kyle doesn’t love her sister and want her to be safe and sober. My point is that Kyle is way more concerned with Kyle above anything else. And Kim’s happiness is the domain of Kim, which she, by her own admission, has finally taken responsibility for. So good for her. And good for Ken. And onward and upward we go.
