Is Real Housewife Heather Gay a Hypocrite for Taking Ozempic?

The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City this is the best soap opera on television, week after week offering twists more shocking than secret twins and characters returning from the dead. That's because it's all real and takes place in the most haunted suburb in the continental United States.

Where else are two women bonded over knowing their child's long-lost biological father? Is there another city where women fight over body positivity in a parking lot on the side of a snowy mountain? Of course, there is no other place on Earth where Lisa Barlow could hear the voice of reason.

Over the snowy slopes in a reflexology bar and spa, the soapy reality of Lisa knowing the man who fathered Bronwyn's daughter Gwen, whatever that means, is discussed. Back at the Milwaukee airport, they discussed Gwen and Bronwyn harmlessly showed Lisa a photo of her father. There Lisa realized that she knew him. (He died 15 years ago.)

Bronwyn details a conversation she had with his family at the age of 19, detailing how she was treated coldly and subsequently fired. The conversation is incredibly raw—despite the fact that it takes place while spa staff are massaging Lisa and Bronwyn's feet—and peels away the ever-unsettling layers of Mormonism that this show has long made its bread and butter.

Lisa, the only practicing Mormon remaining on the staff, maintains a relationship with her father's family. She says Gwen's grandparents are willing to meet her, but Bronwyn struggles to reconcile their change of mood with the apathetic people she knew.

It's bold and beautiful. It is young and restless. And this is a necessary scene to understand the character of not only Bronwyn, but also Lisa. Despite being a “Mormon 2.0,” Lisa has long been balancing the restrictive views of Mormonism with her own image as a progressive, post-patriarchal woman. She's a necessary foil in a cast full of recovering Mormons balancing Utah's troubled past with her complicated present.

So it's no surprise that the family sings a different tune to Gwen than to Lisa. Salt Lake City, where Lisa lives, is not like the other ladies. Mormonism, which she dismisses as archaic, completely dominates the rest of their experience, further revealing how unique Lisa's views are.

This is very well illustrated by her growing problem with Brittany. Brittany, Mormon 1.0 in every way, has spent the entire season portraying herself as a brand ambassador for naivety, proudly pursuing a fictional relationship with D-list Osmond in hopes of finding self-worth through romance.

While in Milwaukee, Lisa simply told Brittany what is obvious to everyone else: This man sucks and he's playing with you. Lisa comes from reality, and Brittany lives firmly in the land of illusions. She also just canceled her lease. She can't move now!

Brittany is the kind of person you spend two hours on the phone with, listening to all her problems with her boyfriend, before helping her make a difficult but necessary decision. The next time you see her, you will find that she is with him again. And you realize that no matter what you say, she will make the same stupid decision over and over again, and the best thing you can do is stop worrying.

Upon returning home, Brittany was greeted with flowers and a whimsical “love” letter from Jared Osmond. In it, Mr. Osmond says he learned from “a reliable source that your new 'friends' on the show helped make the decision to leave me. How sad.”

“This is the price I pay for loving Real Housewives.” Our personal lives are no longer private,” he adds.

A normal person would take this as a manipulative, disturbing note. However, Brittany is not an ordinary person. She's just a girl in love! She cannot be held responsible for her actions. And maybe she's smarter than we think, as she became the rare friend to get a solo scene (even if Jared's note makes it abundantly clear that Brittany was filming full-time before she was brutally stolen).

The Queen of Salt Lake City meets Jared at one of the five restaurants where the Housewives can film so he can manipulate her into believing that she is a disgusting person who no longer deserves his divine love.

“How is this breakup different from any other breakup?” Brittany asks him. Just a guess, but this may be the only time you initiated this, Brit.

Jared is angry at Brittany for letting Lisa text him from her phone, and Brittany is angry that Lisa is jeopardizing her amazing relationship. Jared sometimes holds her hand, even if he abandons her, when they are around beautiful women. And yes, he uses dating apps – I'm sure to prove that no one else is perfect like Brittany. Lisa is angry because she's trying to threaten this.

Later, on the side of a mountain road, Brittany tries to tell Lisa off. With a plastic unicorn in hand, Brittany tells Lisa she's upset that she “caused a huge rift” between her and Jared.

“You were so mean to him,” Brittany yells, to which Lisa replies, “He deserved it.” And she's right.

Brittany decided to exclude women from her relationships going forward. They just don't understand it. What Brittany doesn't understand is that the man she thinks is her boyfriend doesn't love or respect her, and if Lisa Barlow is acting rational while you're spiraling out of control, you're head over heels in your delusion.

Brittany just wants to go to heaven. How can she do this without the pious spirit of Osmond's descendant? She has already sacrificed her relationship with her children. She puts her snowflake at risk. She can't lose him too! This is truly tragic, although it is so absurd that it continues to cause laughter. The world is a cruel place.

What's great about this episode is that it's grounding. ROSLCwonderfully combining truly over-the-top aspects with the deep-seated trauma of the characters. One second we're listening to Whitney freak out about Lisa badmouthing her on a Housewives fan account, and moments later we're watching Bronwyn have a heartfelt conversation with her daughter about her rocky relationship with her paternal family.

Whitney Drew, as she is called in the episode, spends the episode stewing on the sidelines. First, a hotel employee alerts her that a box was found in Lisa's room: Prisma's gift, which Whitney gave to all the girls. Heather then tells Whitney that Lisa, not Meredith, was the one who started the business drama with Alibaba in the first place. Finally, the podcaster calls Whitney to tell her the devastating news about his background check.

I'll Skip All the Nonsense: Lisa supposedly I leaked this information to my account. FINE? We didn't need a team of independent podcast fact-checkers to tell us that Lisa doesn't like Whitney and is gleefully spreading rumors about her. In any case, in none of these cases did Whitney properly dispute the claim that she shipped her jewelry directly.

Maybe she should spend less time talking to D-list podcasters and more time questioning employees Life Tequila in the mines dig up some diamonds for her. Today no one wants to work.

Well, that's not entirely true. No one works harder than Angie K., who fights to break out of Lisa's shadow and become a true power player. She hired Mary Cosby between seasons and has now launched an all-out attack on her former best friend.

Angie lays it out in a confessional: “It was impossible to make Lisa happy, so she had complaints about every actor (except Jenny Nguyen!). But Angie made the fatal mistake of trusting Heather, who is thoroughly enjoying her reclaimed place as the mean Mormon girl now that she's living with local queen bee Lisa Barlow.

Angie may or may not have meant that Lisa lets her son Henry play until two in the morning. It just depends on whether you think she was giving a general example or making a direct demonstration to Lisa. I err on the side of the latter, and apparently so does Heather, given that this is her way of conveying Angie's words to Lisa. She also adds some sauce and spices, but Heather “thought Angie's words were mean-spirited” and wants to be held accountable.

The lines are drawn. Terrorist trio Lisa, Heather and Meredith are determined to take down Angie K., and as soon as Meredith returns from her bat mitzvah vacation, they'll get down to business. It's a good thing Angie has this anti-evil eye thing on her phone. She also has the second coming on her side, as Mary “God” Cosby makes clear in the episode's final scene. Here Mary mentions Heather doing the stirring and backseat producing.

“I have a feeling you’re leaving a trail of lies,” Mary shoots at Heather, noting the black eye and her refusal to embrace body positivity while using Ozempic. This brings us to the most interesting fight of the episode, as both Mary and Heather make a lot of sense. This is a shocking statement in itself.

Yes, Mary thinks Heather is a little clumsy. She's definitely changed her tone a lot in the five years she's been on television. However, Heather is right: saying “body positivity is a lie” is not a hypocritical statement. We may play dumb, but it's simply true: society treats people differently based on their body size, and Heather's own experience with this issue, further illuminated by a transformation documented on television, is quite interesting.

Maybe Heather is being a bit of a hypocrite. She is, of course, flawed. But since Ozempic has become such a hot topic on Housewives and beyond, Heather's explanation resonates.