Joe Giudice had a lot of explaining to do to his wife Teresa after Sunday's episode of The Real Housewives of New Jersey.

In a new Bravo blog post, the reality star admits that she initially wasn't aware of the ugly insults her husband spewed during a Napa Valley outing in which Joe calls Teresa "my bitch wife" and, most distressing, a "c–t" — getting notified about the on-air tirade shortly before the episode's broadcast.

"Once I watched it, I was sick. I felt like I'd been kicked in the stomach," Teresa wrote in her blog Monday after the episode aired. She admits she had, futilely, "begged" the network to yank the episode before Sunday, but, as Teresa explains, "When you sign up for a TV show, you sign up to show everything. . . Kind of like that other promise: for better or worse. Welcome to the 'worse.'"

Though Joe Giudice's bad behavior is a common storyline on the Bravo series, Teresa insists her husband doesn't speak that way to her at home — and doesn't remember him using such language during their wine country getaway with the Wakiles, Manzos and Gorgas. Still, "It hurt my feelings, and it was horrible to watch played out on national TV," says Teresa, who argued that her husband may have been intoxicated at the time.

"Believe me, if he talked to me like that regularly, we would not be together," the mom of four daughters insists, adding that her husband did apologize after the episode aired — one year after their Napa trip took place. "I don't know why the camera [and alcohol] brings out the worst in him. . . it just does."

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Though she and Joe are on better terms now, the reality star admits that she's considered pulling the plug on their marriage — but is instead weathering the storm.

"Joe and I are happy together now. He's a great dad and a great husband and we still really like each other. He's not perfect, I'm not perfect, but you put up with each other's faults for the good of the whole," she writes. "Should I break up my family and leave him because he called me an ugly name a year ago? My pride wants to of course, but I don't think that's the right or responsible thing to do."

"People don't stay married for decades without bumps in the road," continues the cookbook author, who shares daughters Gia, 11, Gabriella, 7, Milania, 6, and Audriana, 2. "So this is a pretty big bump, but I'm hanging on."

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