Strip Searches, Maggots & MORE! 15 Of Teresa's Prison Secrets Exposed

Giudice, 43, had her own security while in prison, though she didn't pay for the detail. "I didn't hire anyone to be my body guard," she said. "When I got here, though, this towering Big Bertha type told me on the sly that she would look out for me. Protect me. Kick anyone's ass who dared to mess with me. I told her she didn't have to do that, but she did it anyway."

In the book, Giudice complained about the food… especially when she found bugs in it. "Sometimes the food had maggots in it, too, like the rice, for example," she wrote. "To me, that was the worst thing I had ever seen."

Security at the prison wasn't thrilled that Bravo recorded Giudice's phone calls home and aired it on the Teresa Checks In special. "About two weeks before the first episode was set to air, I got in trouble for calling home and having the production company record my voice while I was talking to my family," she admitted. "They gave me a shot because they said I'd had 'unauthorized contact with the public.'"

Male fans reached out to Giudice. "I had a lot of men write to me," she confessed. "Some of them told me I needed a 'real man' like them and to ditch Joe, which always made me laugh. I got a lot of letters and cards from other male inmates across the country, asking me to be their pen pals."

Giudice stayed in touch with her former costar Dina Manzo while locked up. "I missed Dina a lot, and hearing her lovely voice just brought back so many memories of a great friendship," she said.

The first time Giudice was given prison issued pants and shirt, she revealed, "I tried not to think about the faint stains I saw on the pants the guard had given me, and I couldn't help wondering how the hell I was going to be able to put them on."

The introduction to her living quarters almost made her physically sick. "I almost gagged, though, when I saw stains on my mattress," she wrote. "Was that urine? Dried blood? Or something else?"

Giudice's first strip search completely mortified her. "I felt sick to my stomach," she stated. "I was embarrassed and humiliated. I had never felt more vulnerable in my life."

But Giudice still got to pamper herself with spa treatments. She got weekly manicures, got her hair done and makeup done often, and even indulged in massages. "Another thing I hadn't expected was that you basically had spa services at your disposal—prison-style," she explained. She even had another inmate make her a sleeping mask that she wore at nights.

Giudice also made friends with another girl from New Jersey who was in prison for committing a similar crime. "Shannon was a really sweet woman from New Jersey, who was in prison for mortgage fraud," Giudice wrote. "I had a feeling she was a Jersey girl because she came to prison with a spray tan… I'm so lucky she ended up being one of my closest friends in there."

While locked up, Giudice's enemy Danielle Staub got engaged, but she only wished her former costar all the best. "When I found out in prison that she got engaged, I said, 'Good for her!' and I meant it," Giudice noted. "Though I don't ever see a day where we will be BFFs, I wish her well."

She even made amends with her brother, Joe Gorga. "My brother and I were getting along better when I was in prison, thank God," Giudice said. "I had no idea that it would take me being in prison for us to finally break down those walls between us."

And Giudice has also made strides with her sister-in-law, Melissa Gorga. "Melissa and I were also in a good place when I went to prison," she said. "My hope was that we could continue to get along when I got out. I wanted to feel close to her again and I was was hoping she did, too. But these things take time. And that's OK."