‘90 Day Fiancé’ Fans Call Out Bilal for ‘Gaslighting’ Shaeeda With His ‘Twisted Practical Joke’
On The May 1 episode of 90 Day Fiancé, Shaeeda finally sees Bilal’s real home after his “prank” on her. However, Bilal’s test backfired on him. Even Shaeeda called him out for his “twisted practical joke.” However, fans think what Bilal did was the definition of gaslighting.
Bilal’s strange ‘prank’ on Shaeeda
42-year-old Bilal, a successful real estate investor and agent, prepares for his fiancée’s arrival. Shaeeda, a 37-year-old yoga instructor from Trinidad and Tobago, moves to Kansas City, Mo, to marry Bilal.
Just ahead of Shaeeda’s arrival, Bilal decides he will pull a prank on her. He admits that the stunt is part “prank” and part “test.” He explains the plan to the cameras, “I’m going to pick up Shaeeda in a van that’s not mine. It’s a work van, so it’s been used, abused for a bit.” Bilal continues, “Also, I’m going to bring her to my childhood home, the home that I actually grew up in.”
After Shaeeda was picked up in a dirty work van and brought to Bilal’s worn-down childhood home, she admitted to feeling “deceived.” She said to her fiancé, “You should have let me in on this from day one. You should have let me know. So I would have been able to know how to move when I come here. But right now, I feel completely deceived.”
Shaeeda calls Bilal’s prank a ‘twisted practical joke’
On the May 1 episode of 90 Day Fiancé Season 9, Bilal decides to end the trick and show Shaeeda his real home. While wearing his “B grateful” shirt, Bilal says, “Welcome to your new home. This is where you’ll be staying at.” She is so happy she falls to the ground. She says, “This is what I’m talking about, babe. I call this ‘an oasis of sophistication.'”
Despite being so happy about the home she will be living in, she still feels bitter about Bilal’s prank. She tells the cameras, “Last night, I felt like an elephant was on my shoulder. So much was on my mind. But now, I feel like it’s easier to breathe now, seeing what, you know, he welcomed me to and what we have together now.”
However, Bilal’s prank may have sparked some trust issues with Shaeeda. She says, “Moving forward, I would always be a little skeptical when it comes to trusting what he says 100%.”
She said, “Right now, I do feel relief. But part of me is still like, ‘Okay, so you actually put me through hell, like some sort of twisted practical joke?”
’90 Day Fiancé’ fans are outraged with Bilal’s ‘gaslighting’
Many 90 Day Fiancé fans found Bilal’s prank ridiculous to do to Shaeeda on her first day in the United States. The fans discussed Bilal’s actions in a Reddit thread. One fan said that what Bilal did to Shaeeda was “gaslighting.”
Gaslighting is a psychological term used to describe “a specific type of manipulation where the manipulator is trying to get someone else (or a group of people) to question their own reality, memory or perceptions.”
They wrote, “I know the word is overused a lot, but it truly seems like he is gaslighting her. I mean, when she was like ‘babe, I feel deceived’… and he was like *shocked Pikachu face* ‘deceived how?’ I nearly lost it. She feels deceived because he IS deceiving her, then trying to make her seem crazy for feeling that way!”
Another fan agreed, “Can you imagine someone doing that to you? And then going on and on about how you need to be grateful to them? I am literally going to have a stroke watching this.”
It’s safe to say that Bilal has single-handedly made himself the villain within two days of his fiancée’s arrival in the US. Will he be able to redeem himself?
90 Day Fiancé Season 9 airs Sundays at 8pm EST on TLC.
