Bethenny Frankel was spotted entering a Long Island cemetery on Monday morning for the funeral of her boyfriend, Dennis Shields.
Frankel was photographed in somber black attire, getting out of an SUV while someone held a black umbrella over her head. The picture was published by TMZ, though the Real Housewives of New York star did not stop and say hello.
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Shields was found dead in his apartment in Trump Tower on Friday, according to the report. He had suffered from an overdose of oxycodone, for which he had a prescription. Shields’ assistant told reporters that he was sick when he woke up on Friday, and he asked her to go out and buy Narcan — an emergency treatment to halt an opiate overdose.
Unfortunately, law enforcement sources said that when the housekeeper got back to the apartment, Shields had already passed away.
Shields and Frankel had an on-again off-again relationship going back to 2016, though they had known each other for about 30 years, according to a report by Page Six. They were last seen together as a couple in February, when they went on a vacation to Miami together. It is still unclear whether they were technically dating at the time of Shields’ passing.
Frankel herself addressed their complicated dynamic on numerous occasions. She rarely spoke ill of Shields, instead talking about the difficult nature of relationships in general. In May, she spoke on Steve Harvey’s talk show about the possibility of a future with Shields.
“I’ve been with someone on and off for years,” she said at the time. “It’s like a partnership where if we’re not being teammates and it’s not working and one man is down, then the other man is down. We’re trying to really kind of be good partners and be good teammates and I think relationships oddly are — and this sounds cold — but a little bit like business.”
“If both people aren’t happy about it but slightly uncomfortable and giving up something or giving in [to] something, it doesn’t work,” she went on. “So both partners have to say, ‘All right, I’m in it for this.’”
Frankel revealed that she and Shields may have finally found their footing with that kind of compromise.
“And I think we might be at that point, believe it or not,” she revealed. “I haven’t said that to anyone yet.”
Shields was just 51 years old at the time of his passing.
