The Bachelor‘s resident villain Keira Maguire has broken down on The Project discussing recent revelations she was raised in a polygamist cult.

Speaking to Carrie Bickmore on Wednesday night, the reality show contestant said she felt “forced to confront” her past when Woman’s Day published a story about her father, Alistah Laishkochav, a convicted paedophile who had nine wives and 65 children.

“[I had] no idea it was even coming out,” she told Bickmore of the article, which prompted a A Current Affair report.

“I just couldn’t believe that they wrote a story without coming to me and asking if it was okay.

“Which, you know, obviously now I know that they’ll write whatever they want, they don’t care who they hurt or what they reveal or whether someone doesn’t necessarily want to show it.”

Keira spent the first five years of her life living with the cult before her mother took her to live with her grandparents. Her father was later jailed for seven and a half years for child abuse and died behind bars.

“It has been forced upon me to confront it … It is also awful, seeing things and stories for the first time about things that you don’t even know.”

The 29-year-old said she didn’t celebrate a birthday until age seven. Photo: Network Ten

The 29-year-old account manager from New South Wales then got emotional, saying the hardest part of the media coverage was seeing her mother being dragged into the spotlight.

“When I saw my mum on TV, it was very confronting. That really upset me. I knew she didn’t want to be there. She was the same age I am today when I saw her there. That was very confronting,” Keira said.

The reality star said she always knew she was “different” but didn’t want pity.

“I didn’t know who my mum was until I was five,” she explained, “It sounds strange, but it just is what it is. I didn’t even have birthdays. I think I had my first birthday when I was seven. For other people, it might be really sad. But it’s not, because it’s my story.”

“I also just feel like there’s so many people out there that probably feel like that. That, like, really upsets me,” Keira explained, breaking down in tears.

“To think that other people would have to go through what I went through and to think that they had something to hide…”

Keira said she didn’t regret going on the Network Ten reality series despite the added scrutiny.

“I swear to God, I remember just being like five years old going, ‘Nup, you’ve got this. You control your future’. And I feel like, yes, it has affected the way that I think and the way that I am, but only for good reasons.”