Surviving Mormonism: What we know about series unlocking church's 'secrets and sins' with RHOSLC's Heather Gay

Hit shows like The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives and The Real Housewives Of Salt Lake City have sparked a surge of intrigue into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter‑day Saints, with Utah's most glamorous reality stars painting a picture-perfect image of their world.

However, a new three-part documentary series sees one of the state's most well-known faces dive deeper into the alleged dark side of the church, with those who exited the community speaking their experiences of "abuse" and masking their identities to fit the mould.

Heather Gay is best known for joining the cast of The Real Housewives Of Salt Lake City in 2020, and became a fan-favourite as someone who herself, had left the Mormon community, and was now dedicating her work to helping others in a similar situation to her do the same.

"I may be a bad Mormon, but I’ll always be a good time", she says in her season 3 opening credits tag line on the show.

Gay says she began questioning her faith in the Mormon church after her divorce around 2014, having spent 11 years married to into a Mormon family, when she realised the church's ideology wasn't the world she wanted her daughters to live in.

“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 at the time.

“Mormonism was kind of the center of my universe,” she noted. “It informed every choice I made. 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.”

Now, in her new Bravo documentary, she's joined by other Mormons who have undergone difficult times in the church.

"The things I learned while we were filming this shocked me to my core", she says in the trailer, while an unknown person says later in the clip: "My earliest memories are of abuse."

"I spent my life being someone I wasn't", another person says.

The show has been penned by Bravo as "real stories of secrets and sins", and the announcement has sparked a wave of support for Gay from fans and fellow housewives alike.

Here's what we know about Surviving Mormonism...

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When does Surviving Mormonism with Heather Gay come out?

The three-part series will begin on 11 November, straight after an episode of The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City.

How can I watch Surviving Mormonism with Heather Gay?

It's thought the episodes will be dropped weekly on Bravo, or all episodes are available to stream on Peacock from 12 November.

When did Heather Gay leave the Mormon church?

Gay says she began questioning her faith following her divorce from Frank William "Billy" Gay III in 2014, and how the church's ideologies would affect her daughters, Ashley, 19, Georgia, 17, and Annabelle, 15.

"The reason that I never wanted to leave the church is because I never wanted to put the strain on my community or my family or my closest friends", she told PEOPLE. "All my predictions came true. This is why I stayed for so long, because it's very, very difficult for people to navigate once you're outside the backyard gate. The gate shuts."

Gay eventually asked the Church to expunge her name from its records, and went on to write two books, including a memoir titled 'Bad Mormon' in 2023.

Surviving Mormonism with Heather Gay streams from 11 November

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