The Bachelorette winner Doug Mason was hurt after being name-dropped by ex Taylor Frankie Paul on The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives.
“I told her that I wanted a three-day break of talking, [but] I’ll be honest, how violating,” Doug, 29, said on the Wednesday, October 14, episode of the “Bachelor Happy Hour” podcast. “For Taylor to play a voice note that I sent to her specifically when I was in the thick of that emotion? No, you wouldn’t do that.”
Doug met Taylor, 32, on her now-scrapped season of The Bachelorette, ultimately getting engaged during the finale. The pair, however, quickly went their separate ways after filming wrapped in January and Taylor returned to Utah.
In the days after production wrapped, Taylor began filming for Mormon Wives season 5. At one point, she told costar Jessi Draper that Doug initiated a three-day break in a voice note and played the recording on camera.
While Doug alleged that he never watched the scene — which showed Taylor and her pal seemingly mocking his message — he has since moved on.
“This is where I start to recognize that it was all for the good of my life to not be with Taylor,” he said. “I’m really grateful for the way things transpired. Yes, it was emotionally exhausting. Sure, it took a toll on me psychologically for a few months.”
According to Doug, he even declined a potential appearance on Mormon Wives while trying to navigate the pair’s next steps as a couple.
“While she was filming, I was doing nothing. I didn’t know if I was in a relationship or not, didn’t know if I had a fiancée,” he alleged. “[I] couldn’t talk to my friends, barely could talk to my family. I was going to church every Sunday. I would go to run club twice a week and I would just pray and write in my journal and I would go skiing.”
Doug, who questioned whether Taylor even loved him after seemingly “ridiculing” his emotional voicemail, further denied that he pursued her for fame.
“I hope that me saying that I didn’t go on one of Hulu’s biggest shows would prove to any naysayers that I was not after Taylor’s clout or I wanted any fame at all,” he stated. “At the end of the day, I did go on The Bachelorette. I did go on a reality TV show, it’s true, and the byproduct of going on a TV show is you’re going to get some publicity.”
Doug continued, “I didn’t realize it would be this much, but I just knew that that was what I was walking into. I was aware, but me not going on the Secret Lives should prove to anybody at home that I was not after fame or publicity at all.”
