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TLC’s Seeking Sister Wife follows families who have embraced a polygamous lifestyle. More than a dozen families have been featured since the show premiered in 2018, including the Winders. 

Colton Winder says there’s now no place for his family on ‘Seeking Sister Wife’

Colton Winder and his two wives, Sophie and Tami, live in Utah. They practice polygamy as part of their fundamentalist Mormon faith. The trio joined the Seeking Sister Wife cast in season 2 and returned in season 3. But they were absent from season 4, which aired in 2022. They also are not part of the currently airing fifth season. 

Colton recently shed some light on why he and his family no longer appear on the TLC show, hinting that they did not bring enough drama to the table. 

On Feb. 21, Colton posted a series of photos from a maternity shoot for his wife Sophie, who was expecting her third child. One person asked why the family did not return for Seeking Sister Wife Season 5. 

“Did you see the preview for this upcoming season?” Colton replied. “We did, and while we aren’t judgmental (consenting adults are welcome to live however they choose), I don’t think there’s a place for us on that show, as it presently stands.”

“There honestly may never have been a place for us on Seeking Sister Wife, but we made the best of it we could,” he added. 

The Winders wanted to put a ‘positive face’ on polygamy

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When they signed on for Seeking Sister Wife, the Winders hoped the show would play a role in increasing the acceptance of polygamous relationships. 

“There has been a lot of negativity in the media associated with a belief in plural marriage,” Colton told The Salt Lake Tribune in 2021. “And we felt like this would be a good opportunity for us to put more of a positive face on it.”

They also wanted to move plural marriage out of the shadows in Utah. Until recently, the practice of having multiple wives was a felony in the state. Polygamy was decriminalized in 2022. 

“I like to think that maybe it made an impact,” Colton said. “And that was our biggest reason for wanting to be on television – to try and make an impact for our community and try and improve our situation here at home in Utah. 

But the Winders story apparently didn’t resonate with viewers or with the network’s vision for the show. Ahead of the season 4 premiere, Colton shared that his family had not been invited back for the upcoming season. 

“As some of you have seen, we won’t be back for season 4 of Seeking Sister Wife,” he wrote in a March 2022 Instagram post. “It makes sense to us why we weren’t picked back up, as we’ve seen the show is taking a different path. We wish the other families well, and we’re grateful to TLC for the opportunity we had to tell our story, and we’ll continue to tell our story on our social media, faithfully, and honestly.”

Seeking Sister Wife airs Mondays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on TLC. Episodes also stream on Max. 

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