Mikayla Matthews quit Mormon Wives over the Taylor Frankie Paul scandal: "There's no amount of money worth going against my morals"
She made the decision over a week ago and posted it tonight, while the rest of the cast is in Italy shooting season 6 without her. Mikayla Matthews is off The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, and her statement does not bother being diplomatic about why.
The cast of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives is in Italy filming season 6. Mikayla Matthews is not with them, and as of this evening she has said publicly that she is not coming.
Matthews posted the decision to Instagram, and it is not a soft exit. "I made my decision over a week ago, after hearing some news, that I will not be continuing the show at this moment," she wrote, in a statement first reported by Deadline and Variety.
"I've said from the beginning of this that I'm not comfortable being a part of something that continues to platform behavior I don't agree especially given my own experience growing up in a home with multiple forms of abuse. There's no amount of money worth going against my morals." — Mikayla Matthews
The line that will travel furthest is the one about the paycheck. "Continuing to directly profit from this behavior feels wrong and unethical," she wrote. "It feels like a disservice to the children, everyone's healing and the millions of people watching." She is careful to say what the show gave her — it "has been a huge part of my life and has helped me provide for my family" — and closes the door anyway.
What she is refusing to be part of
The "news" she refers to is not spelled out, but the context is not subtle. Matthews has spent months objecting publicly to the conduct of castmate Taylor Frankie Paul, whose off-screen life has been the show's engine since the first episode.
- 2022. Paul goes viral for revealing that she and her then-husband had been "soft-swinging" with other couples — the story that built MomTok's audience.
- February 2023. Paul is arrested after a domestic violence incident involving boyfriend Dakota Mortensen. The series premiere puts it on screen.
- March 2026. Season 5 filming pauses while another allegation against Paul is investigated.
- This year. TMZ publishes footage of an altercation in which Paul throws metal chairs at Mortensen. Both sides make domestic violence allegations, mutual restraining orders follow, and a custody fight starts.
- 2026. Paul's season of The Bachelorette is pulled.
A reality show built on one woman's worst week has a structural problem: the worse the weeks get, the better the show does.
Season 5 arrived on Hulu on 10 September with five episodes, and it contains several arguments between Matthews and Paul — Matthews calling out patterns in Paul's dating life, Paul finding her judgmental. Those scenes were shot before the footage surfaced. Four days after they landed in front of an audience, Matthews walked.
Read more: Kody and Robyn Brown have left Sister Wives after 16 years
Where that leaves season 6
The show has been extraordinarily productive: five seasons since 6 September 2024, a cast of nine, Hulu at home and Disney+ abroad. Season 6 is already shooting, and it is not clear how much of Matthews is in it.
Two of her castmates, Mayci Neeley and Layla Taylor, left messages of support under the post. Neither Hulu nor the production has commented, and Paul has not responded publicly; she said recently that she has "stayed in, single and celibate" since the Bachelorette cancellation.
Matthews says she will keep "sharing my story, my health and advocating for myself and others". What she will not do is be paid for it by this show — a rare sentence in reality television, and worth noting who said it first.
Previously we wrote: Big Brother 28 week 10
