The Big D Star Angelique Talks Leaving the Mormon Church to Follow Her Heart

The Big D gathers divorcees from all walks of life for their chance at love again, whether it’s with their ex or someone new. For Angelique, who arrived on the show as a single without her ex, she not only gets a chance at a meaningful connection but to reinvent herself now that she doesn’t have the heavy weight of her religion and its demands on her shoulders.

Angelique revealed in the latest episode of The Big D that she grew up in the Mormon Church. She recently spoke with USA Insider about her experience as a Mormon and how that impacted her decisions on the show. Although the Mormon religion she grew up in does promote marriage and expects it to last forever, she had to learn that's not always the case.

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“I got married at a very young age. I got married at 20 and I was a part of a very religious community that there was pressure to get married at a young age and live a certain way that completely didn't align with what I wanted," she explained. "It's just kind of what I went along with because I felt like that's what I was supposed to do."

On the show, she talks about leaving the Mormon Church at the same time she decided to end her marriage. It’s part of the reason she was able to go on a show and pursue dating amongst her peers of other divorcees. She says it was difficult but she was finally ready in her healing journey.

“For the last four years, I’ve been on a healing process to figure out what I want and what’s meaningful to me, and not an outside religion telling me what the best thing is to do,” Angelique told USA Insider. “I’ve had so much self-development over the last few years of figuring out what I want my life to look like as far as dating. I mean, I know from the experiences I've had what I want and what I don't want.”

She went on to share how her religious upbringing and the influence it had on her life isn’t a huge part of her dating life anymore.

“I don’t know if now, today, it really affects my dating other than the past experience and what it’s brought me to today,” she explained.

While it’s not affecting her dating decisions, Mormonism still has a little bit of a reach in her inner circle.

“It’s in the past, but it also makes it tough because my family is very much involved in the Mormon Church still, and very big believers,” she noted.

But, for Angelique, walking away from a religion she has known all of her life was something she felt was right for her well before she even thought about going on a show like The Big D to find love.

“There had to be a point of me just stepping away and committing to doing what felt right to me and allowing what other people thought to just kind of drift away, and go back to the back of my mind and just really move forward and follow my heart,” she concluded.

We’ll see where her heart leads her as The Big D continues this season.

The Big D  airs on Wednesdays at 10 PM ET right after new episodes of Temptation Island as part of USA’s Wednesday night "Hump Day" programming line-up.