“I immediately cringed because I thought, Oh, I could never proudly say ‘bad Mormon’ that would be blasphemous, and I’d be ruined,” Gay said. The idea for Bad Mormon came from Gay’s publisher, who suggested it after Real Housewives musical-parody writer Dylan MarcAurele posted a song with that title during the COVID-19 lockdown. Prior to her book release, Gay asked the Church to expunge her name from its records - a standard request typically granted by bishops - but the LDS appears determined to prevent Gay from profiting off the break.

“I’m a bad Mormon now because I stopped believing in this institution that had bigoted principles and was teaching me to basically look at my daughters and lie to them and say, ‘You know, marriage is only between a man and a woman, women can never have the priesthood, and men are the only way we can get into heaven,’” Gay said. Gay said things changed when she decided to start living her life authentically for herself and her daughters, Ashley, 19, Georgia, 17, and Annabelle, 15.

How I dressed, what I ate, where I went to college, who I married, how I got married, and that I was a stay-at-home mom.” “Mormonism was kind of the center of my universe,” she said.

Gay’s clean break from the religion finally happened when she realized the negative “through-line” in her life was Mormonism. She writes that the congregation began to treat her differently, and she lost friends and close family members as she became ostracized from her community. She attended Brigham Young University, served as a missionary volunteer representative in France, and married into Mormon royalty. But if the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the erstwhile Mormon Church, has anything to say about it, there is no way in outer darkness Gay should be allowed to capitalize on being a “bad Mormon.” Following the February 7 release of her memoir, titled Bad Mormon, the Church is opposing Gay’s request to sell merchandise to fans (and other ex-Mormons) with the cheeky name. She “brazenly” displays a coffee maker in her kitchen and refers to it as her first “open sin.” She recently got so drunk while filming Real Housewives of Salt Lake City she blacked out and couldn’t remember how she woke up with a black eye. She ended her “eternal” marriage by getting divorced. Heather Gay knows all about being a bad Mormon.

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