‘Extreme’ Gig Harbor twins are psyched for reality TV debut
Look out Gig Harbor, you’re about to have your five minutes of fame. A duo of local twin sisters are set to be on the new TLC show ‘Extreme Sisters’ premiering on April 25.
Christina Manning and Jessica Dunagan, 37, are known as the ‘Psychic Sisters.’ The sisters say TLC found them through a YouTube video they had posted on their old channel.
The premise of the show, according to a release from TLC, is that it follows “the most obsessive and inseparable sibling relationships” as they “take their obsession to the extreme.”
The show describes Christina and Jessica as “inseparable” and that they “feel physically sick when they are apart.” They supposedly “even have a code word for each other that signals to the other that no matter what they’re doing at that time, they must drop it and rush to one another’s sides.”
TLC is a cable channel owned by Discovery, the megamedia group that also owns HGTV, the Food Nework, Animal Planet, Motortend and other cable staples. Once known as The Learning Channel, TLC has since become a a downmarket venue for “reality” shows like “90-Day Fiance,” “Sister Wives,” “My Fat Fabulous Life” and “Dr. Pimple Popper.”
Parallel lives
In an interview with The Gateway, the duo expressed excitement about the show.
“Gig Harbor is going to be on TV,” Dunagan said.
The sisters were raised in Oregon before moving to the Seattle area, then Tacoma, before eventually coming to Gig Harbor when they both got divorced.
“We both got divorced at the same time, so our lives have been very parallel,” Dunagan said. “We were married at the same time, had our babies at the same time, both went through divorces at the same time.”
The sisters now raise their three kids together. Manning has a five-year-old daughter and a six-year-old boy; Dunagan has a five-year-old boy. The kids will also appear in the show. “They’re going to have some cameos in the show,” Manning said. “They absolutely loved it, they loved having the cameras around. Instead of saying we’re being filmed, they would say ‘we’re being famous.’”
Unlike other area residents who have previously been on a reality show, the fact that they were “being famous” didn’t come as a surprise to Manning.
“I’ve kind of known this for a while now, because we are intuitive, and I felt psychic promotions as far back as, gosh, five to six years that I was going to be on TV,” Manning said. “I actually knew it was going to be TLC too. It’s still surreal to me, but I intuitively knew it was going to happen, anyway if that makes sense.”
Intuition as a profession
The sisters said their close bond comes from intuition.
“Our relationship is intuitive,” Dunagan said. “We know what each other is feeling and we give predictions on each other’s lives.”
It also runs in the family.
“We’ve been doing this since we were 18, 19 years old. Our mom was intuitive so we kind of grew up in this world,” Dunagan said.
They turned their intuition into a profession, offering readings and life coaching to people. On their website, www.jesstina.com, the sisters explain how their “natural born intuitive gift” helps to create “a unique experience because they are able to guide their clients in more ways than one.”
They also wrote a cookbook, ‘Charge Your Food, Change Your Life.’ A description of the book says it will tell you how to “charge your food with Reiki energy,” which the sisters explained means “spiritually guided life force energy.”
The sisters say the motivation for their work came when they both fell ill, prompting them to take a different life path. According to their web site, “The sisters knew that this was their calling when they mysteriously became ill at 18 years old. They were both enrolled in nursing school but their illness derailed those plans. During their journey back to health, they started to become more aware of their gifts and how they could use them to help others,” Dunagan said.
Filmed in August
They started filming for the show in August of 2020, late due to COVID-19. “It was kind of weird because quarantine changed the schedule. We went into lockdown but we were supposed to start filming even sooner,” Manning said. “We just wrapped up our filming last month, actually.”
Even with the added challenges of the pandemic, they said they had a good time. “It was such a fun experience,” Manning said. “I definitely showed all of my vulnerabilities because I was so natural with the cameras, I forgot they were there. I just lived my life and they were there to capture it.”
That included differences with each other and figuring out how to work through problems that are still present in their lives.
“Our challenges were with each other,” Manning said. “Things are still up in the air, I don’t think they’ve been overcome yet.” The primary problem? A new boyfriend that introduces a new emotional dynamic into their relationship.
“I can’t give spoilers, but she (Christina) has a new boyfriend so it’s going to be the journey of bringing this new boyfriend into our sisterhood. It is just about embracing the good and the bad that comes with being intuitive,” Dunagan said.
“Extreme Sisters” will air Sunday nights at 7 p.m. (PDT) beginning April 25 on TLC. The channel also streams on Hulu, YouTube TV and other streaming services.
A sneak peak of the trailer is available on You Tube. Go to www.youtube.com and search for “Extreme Sisters”
This story was originally published April 21, 2021 at 7:12 AM.
