Social media influencer Aspyn Ovard is opening up about her young daughter's terminal cancer diagnosis for the first time on "The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives: Orange County," the latest spinoff of the hit Hulu reality series, which premiered Thursday, Nov. 12.
“Everything happened just so out of nowhere. One day she was OK and the next day she wasn’t,” Ovard said through tears in a confessional on the show.
The new series follows a group of women navigating motherhood, relationships and the expectations of their conservative religious upbringings. For 30-year-old Ovard, one of the franchise's newest cast members, that includes sharing a deeply personal family struggle she had previously kept out of the public eye.
Ovard shares three daughters
– Cove, Lola and Elle – with her ex-husband, Parker Ferris. She has not publicly identified which daughter has cancer or disclosed the specific diagnosis. The family has been living with the uncertainty surrounding her daughter's health for more than three years.
The budding reality star rose to fame as a lifestyle and family vlogger, building a following by documenting her life, relationships and experiences as a mother.
“You can’t fathom they’re actually gonna tell you that your baby has cancer, and that it’s terminal and she could be gone in a month,” Ovard explained about the moment she and her then-husband found out about her daughter’s diagnosis.
Aspyn Ovard opens up about daughter's cancer diagnosis
On the first season of "The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives: Orange County," viewers watch as Ovard recalls how quickly her family's life changed after learning about her daughter's diagnosis, describing the shock of discovering that her child had a terminal illness. More than three years later, the family continues to navigate the uncertainty surrounding her health, never knowing how much time they have left together.
The emotional toll has been overwhelming for both parents, who have spent years balancing the demands of raising their children with the fear and uncertainty of their daughter's prognosis.
The diagnosis also complicated an already troubled marriage. Ovard and Ferris, who married in 2015 and divorced in 2024, were experiencing relationship problems before their daughter's illness. On the show, Ovard opened up about feeling betrayed after discovering Ferris had lied to her for years about his drinking, adding another layer of tension to an already difficult situation.
“My marriage was nowhere near in a place to be able to make it through something like this. We weren’t even going to make it through before this happened,” Ovard said on the show. “It was just so toxic and hard and through all of it, I feel like I still tried to take care of him because I know how hard he’s grieving.”
Why Aspyn Ovard kept her daughter's illness private
Although people close to her knew about her family's circumstances, Ovard said she struggled with how to share the diagnosis with her millions of followers. She said in an interview with People that participating in the reality series ultimately helped her tell the story with support from the show's production team.
“Being able to hand my story over and have help in crafting that and showing what my life actually looks like kind of took some weight off of me, even though it is a very heavy thing to share,” she said. “It was definitely a big decision and something that I’m just hoping I feel good about in the end because I just haven’t really known how to share my life over the last few years.”
Beyond their daughter’s cancer diagnosis, the season delves into Ovard’s complicated relationship with Ferris, including a particularly heated therapy session, while also exploring her unconventional romantic relationship with married couple Bri and Billy Davis.
"The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives: Orange County" is now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney+.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Mormon Wives' star Aspyn Ovard reveals 3-year-old daughter has terminal cancer
