Exclusive: Missy Payne talks 'Survivor: San Juan del Sur -- Blood vs. Water' (Part 2)

Survivor: San Juan del Sur -- Blood vs. Water castaway Missy Payne finished the 29th season in third place, losing the $1 million grand prize to Natalie Anderson, during the live portion of the finale broadcast on CBS.
 
Natalie beat the runner-up Jaclyn Schultz, a 25-year-old media buyer from Las Vegas, NV, and Missy, a 47-year-old owner of a competitive cheerleading gym from Dallas, TX, in the season's final jury voting results.


Missy received only one jury vote from her daughter Baylor Wilson. Jaclyn earned two votes and Natalie got herself at least four. Jon Misch and Reed Kelly were the castaways who voted for Jaclyn.

Below is the concluding portion of Missy's exclusive interview with Reality TV World. Click here to read the first half.

Reality TV World: When I talked to Natalie, she said she thought your own chances in the Final 3 would be stronger without Baylor there versus with Baylor.

Missy Payne: Absolutely. Absolutely. My chances would've been so much stronger just because, who on the jury is going to vote for a couple? I mean, you look at the last Blood vs. Water and clearly they all played the game once before. They started taking each other out right at the gate. So, I don't know.


Because none of it felt right, you know, that whole thing of, "Wait a minute." I needed Baylor on the jury to have a vote, have a for-sure vote. So, yeah, there was no way I could've gone to the Final 3 with her for real.

Reality TV World: Had you begun formulating a plan in your mind -- whether it was the Final 4 or 5 -- to vote Baylor off?

Missy Payne: No, I mean, I was letting it play itself out. And then Natalie was so hell-bent on getting rid of Jon that Baylor -- the decision about Baylor -- kind of got put on hold at that point and I got hurt.

So then I was even more, like I said earlier, it was like in a standstill, you know, "Oh my God, what's going to happen?!" And so Natalie ultimately made the decision for me. So I didn't really have to make the choice, which was fabulous.

Reality TV World: What about after that, when Jaclyn approached you about voting off Natalie instead of Keith? What were you thinking at that exact moment? How close did you actually come to doing that and how about Jaclyn?


Missy Payne: I mean, I feel like Jaclyn, if I said, "Let's pull the trigger," she would've jumped on it. But the problem was, her timing was horrible. She came to me literally, like, right before we were leaving for Tribal.

And, you know, again. It was hard logistically for people to have conversations with me because I was in the center of camp trying to hold court in our shelter, which doesn't work. You have to go off and have conversations.

And again, I'm on crutches, I've got an eight-pound cast on me. But yeah, Jaclyn, that would've been an amazing play if you had come to me yesterday maybe.

And the thing too about Jaclyn is -- it's almost like dealing with a bunch of children that, all of a sudden, you know, it's like in cheerleading. They get the blue ribbon one time and then all of a sudden they're like, "Oh, this is great. We're the best and so we're going to win every competition from here on out." And I'm like, "Hold on. Slow down."

Jaclyn was at the bottom of the barrel, and within 24 hours, turned back around and Miss America was ontop of the game. And so, she got a little excited, and I was like, "Oh my gosh." It's kind of like what Keith said, "Let's stick to the plan," you know, "be consistent."


So yeah, would I have done that maybe the day before or two days before? That would've been a great, huge move on my part. But at the time that Jaclyn came to me, there was no way.

Reality TV World: Once you got to Tribal Council, Natalie made that comment about feeling like she deserved to win Survivor. It was right before the vote in which you were deciding to get rid of her or Keith. Were you surprised she had the guts to say that? It seemed really brazen. Did that have any impact on you at all?

Missy Payne: You know, at that moment, it was -- I mean, anything can happen at Tribal. You had no idea what really was going to come out of people's mouths, but yeah, for a sec, it was, like I said again, I felt like I was this mom hurting all these kids to try to get them just to be consistent and don't be sporadic.

And that was, to me, a little out of left field and a tiny bit of arrogance coming in. I was thinking, "Now hold on a second, where is this coming from?" So, it's hard to -- on Survivor, I think people watching in their living rooms will go, "Oh my gosh! Vote for so and so" at Tribal.

But you have to truly make a decision before you go in there, because if you listen to all those people, there's so much manipulation happening at that moment. And then, you don't really look back at what's happened in the past and you don't really look at the big picture at that point if you allow your mind to listen.


And so, Keith might've been made fun of all over the Internet, but he was right. It's like, "Stick to the plan," because you reason with everybody before Tribal and you go around and around, and it's very clear before you walk in there.

It's like anything in life. I have not made the best decisions under the gun -- ever, clearly. And most of my marriages were just that. So, I know we talked a lot about Missy being married and divorced, well, guess what?

Those decisions were not based upon great information. They were based upon kind of split-second decisions. And it's the same thing that, I mean, look what happened! And so, I just don't think that that's a great thing to do, to walk into Tribal and decide right there.

Reality TV World: Why did you assume you'd be the one going home when Natalie played her idol for Jaclyn? Because it seemed kind of obvious you were the less physical threat in the upcoming Individual Immunity Challenge given the condition of your foot. Did you still find yourself to be the bigger threat?

Missy Payne: Well, here's the deal. So Natalie and I had this little pinky promise that we did. It was pretty cute. So before every Tribal, we would squeeze pinkies, which basically just sealed the deal once again, like, "We're together, we got this thing, and we're not going to do anything against one another. We've kept our word."


The two times that didn't happen or the time that I voted with everybody against [Jeremy Collins] and the night that Natalie voted off Baylor, I knew something was up going in. I just didn't exactly know the plan, and it was so crazy. At that point, man, she was making moves left and right, like, awesome. So, I just didn't know.

But what you guys didn't see is that, so I was kind of looking at Baylor going, "I'm going home. I love you," whatever. And Natalie said, "Oh, you're not going home!" (Laughs) And so, you know, then I figured it out. It was like, "Oh God, she's going to take out Baylor." So yeah, it was a lot of, sort of, wondering what was going to happen next, you know?! (Laughs)

Reality TV World: Could you talk a little bit about your relationship with Jon while you were out there? You two seemed really close and you were both criticized for that. Even Jaclyn didn't seem to be happy about that at times.

Missy Payne: I love Jon. I do, to this day, love Jon -- as a mom. I think the problem is that people forget how old I am, and sometimes, you know, it becomes somewhat of a threat, I feel like, with other women when I have a conversation with men in general. Jaclyn is very protective and she is territorial in general, and I don't blame her.

But Jon and I had some unbelievable conversations and he is very close to his mom at home, but I don't think you can always tell your blood-mom every single thing. I think that everybody needs another mom on the planet to talk about things with.

And, you know, yeah, he was certainly open with me and we talked through things. I truly believe that Jon in his heart of hearts -- he told me last night [so] many times -- how sorry he was.


I got apologies left and right from him because he did believe that I was the one that had completely knocked him in the kneecaps, and it wasn't me. We have a very precious relationship. It will never change. I guarantee you I'll be at the wedding next fall for the two of them, and yeah, it's just an awesome relationship.

Click here to read the first half of Missy Payne's exclusive interview with Reality TV World.






About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski