Bad Mormon

On a flight from Los Angeles to Salt Lake City, Heather Gay debates whether or not she wants to join the reality television show that she has been offered. A life-long lover of reality TV, she also knows that joining the show would mean abandoning the church she grew up in. She realizes that her fairy-tale life has already imploded, and that the TV show will offer her an escape from her current life.

At age six, Heather Gay walked out her back gate, despite her parents warnings, and found herself unable to get back in. Lost and afraid, she decided that her parents’ rules were in place to protect her, not to restrict her.

Gay’s parents were devout Mormons. Because they were married in the church, Gay is considered a born-in-the-covenant (BIC) Mormon. Her mother was also a BIC Mormon, and her ancestors were among the original settlers in Utah. Gay’s parents met in college and quickly married, and her mother quit school after becoming pregnant. After seven moves to support her husband’s career, Gay’s mother insisted that the family settle permanently in Colorado.

As a child, Gay viewed Mormonism as an all-American way of life, and assumed that most families on television were Mormon because of their wholesome nature.