Gina Kirschenheiter Feels 'Bad' for Shannon Beador After DUI: 'I'm Not Going to Kick Someone When They're Down'

Gina Kirschenheiter has compassion for Shannon Storms Beador as her Real Housewives of Orange County costar deals with the fallout of a recent DUI arrest.

Kirschenheiter, 39, addressed the recent legal trouble Storms Beador, 59, has encountered on her Orange Country podcast Wednesday, telling co-host Shane McAnally: “You and I both can relate to what’s happening here, sympathize to what’s happening here. Yes, obviously, you can’t ignore ... the irony of it, which is major.” 

Kirschenheiter herself was stopped for a traffic violation in 2019 and arrested for driving under the influence. Beador has brought up her fellow Housewife's struggles at the time — which was in the midst of her split from ex-husband Matt Kirschenheiter — as recently as this season, fracturing the women's relationship both on and off screen.

Despite this tension, Kirschenheiter said on Wednesday's podcast: “But honestly, at the end of the day ... I just don’t have it in me. I’m not going to kick someone when they’re down, and I’ve been down. I know where she’s at right now. It’s not a good place to be — mentally, emotionally.”

Kirschenheiter said her “first instinct” after she initially heard the news of Beador’s DUI arrest was ”‘Oh my God, thank God she didn’t hurt herself seriously or injure anyone else.” 

“It’s obviously the worst mistake you can make,” she said. “I am a wholehearted believer in that, having made that mistake myself. So I’m just glad everybody’s OK. But like — it sucks. It’s hard. I feel bad. I feel bad for her.”

She continued, “I’m not going to lie to everybody and say that I didn’t wake up and say, ‘Oh s---, this is like a karma. ... I got angry about a lot of it for a minute, and I really now have settled into appropriate sympathy for the situation and for her. I don’t want to see anybody down. I never have. I just didn’t want to be put down, you know?”

The reality star went on to discuss the changes she’s undergone since her own DUI arrest, saying that she’s taken “full responsibility” for what happened and “course corrected” that bad decision to the point where she hasn’t had a drink in two years. 

She also conceded that Beador “did initially help” by giving her the contact information of her criminal defense attorney friend, who got her arrest warrant recalled after she failed to appear in court for a hearing related to her DUI arrest.

“But ever since then she has been using that help that she gave to me as a weapon and I wanted her to stop weaponizing that,” Kirschenheiter said. “So for me to now have this happen to her, and to immediately hit her over the head with it and weaponize it would be extremely hypocritical and I would not do that. It’s not in my nature.”

“When I [got the DUI], I was on the show for a year. She’s been on the show for a very long time. She’s very well-known. And she’s been crapping all over me for this very thing,” she continued. “This is the worst thing that could have happened to her right now in this moment, and I feel bad for her. It was her choice, she put herself there, she definitely made this bed. But I believe that she should have the opportunity to right this wrong.”

And just like Beador had helped her before, Kirschenheiter said she was open to paying back the favor and helping her turn things around.

“We have to accept and allow people to be wrong, to mess up, and to recover, and to support them to pull themselves up. I don’t know if Shannon’s doing go to that or not, that’s up to her,” she said. “But I know that I will support her and I will be there to help her however I can to try and help her get back up.”

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The Real Housewives of Orange County airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET on Bravo.