Mikayla Matthews’ husband was how old when they got together?!
The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives star Mikayla is the youngest of the bunch. When the “grandma” of the cast is barely past 30, that’s saying a lot.
People who’ve followed the drama of Mormon MomTok aren’t feeling worried about her current age.
Instead, the issue is about how old Mikayla Matthews’ husband was when they first got together. She was only 16.
Mikayla Matthews isn’t hiding how things started with her husband
Under /momtokgossip, Reddit denizens highlighted Mikayla Matthews’ own social media posts about her relationship.
Mikayla turned 24 earlier this year. Her husband, Jace, is nearly 30. That’s not only “no big deal,” but no deal whatsoever — just a married couple in their twenties. A little young to be married and a lot young to have three kids, but otherwise normal, right?
However, Redditors spied a huge red flag in their relationship, highlighting that Mikayla Matthews was 16 when her husband was 21.
“Me and my husband turning 22 and 27 this year after 3 amazing kids,” Mikayla Matthews wrote about herself and husband Jace Terry in the resurfaced post. She turned 22 in early 2022.
“Us at 16 and 21,” Mikayla then wrote, showing old footage from, one assumes, 2016 or early 2017 when she was the age of a high school student and Jace was an adult of legal drinking age.
The couple’s current photos look normal and very cute. But many on social media found this revelation jarring. What kind of a grown man in his 20s, however early, starts up a relationship with a teen?
Fans don’t know what to make of Mikayla Matthews’ husband or their age gap …
On Reddit, one commenter wrote: “I think the age gap [right now] is fine but 16 and a 21 year old … she was a child.”
A reply to that comment reads: “This led me to Google to find out that the Romeo and Juliet law in Utah allows a 7 year age difference for minors and their ‘partners.’”
Another denizen of Reddit shared their own painful perspective: “This age gap is not okay. I got married at 16 to a 21 year old. I spent the next 6 years being abused. You are not old enough to make those decisions at 16.”
Age gaps have become a hot topic in recent years. While it’s good that more people pay attention to them, especially as they intersect with topics like predation and sexism, it’s clear that some people have lost the plot.
If you’ve ever seen a post on social media warning high school or even college classmates to not date each other if they’re in different grades, you’ve seen this firsthand. Online commentary on celebrity marriages can feel similarly unhinged.
Yes, there are people — famous and otherwise — who pursue relationships that are (or should be) illegal. There are also just adults who are a few years apart but have a great relationship. What’s Mikayla’s situation?
So, does the age gap matter?
There is, to be blunt, no good reason for a 16-year-old to be with a 21-year-old. Something being legal in Utah does not mean that it is ethical. “Romeo and Juliet” laws make sense so that high school classmates who are dating each other don’t face arrest when one has a birthday — which is obviously not the case with that age gap.
This is not the only The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives couple with a controversial age gap. However, there is some nuance to Mikayla’s situation. Simply put, what she has shared from her backstory shows that age gaps were not her biggest concern.
She moved out of her parents’ home when she was 15 and began living with her sister. She met a guy and very quickly became pregnant. Which is to say that, according to Mikayla’s own TikTok, a number of things had clearly gone wrong in her young life before she met her husband.
A 5-year age gap between adults is generally pretty meaningless. Two people in their twenties are almost always social peers. The only concern here is over Mikayla’s age when they got together. A 5-year gap is a lifetime when you’re 16.
It’s possible that Jace will win over The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives viewers. He’s handsome, he looks age-appropriate for her (now), and he and Mikayla seem to have a good relationship.
Sometimes, you wince at a relationship’s backstory and go “I guess?” at the current state of things. It’s not a celebration, but an acceptance of a less than pristine love story. Mikayla Matthews and her husband could be one of those couples.
