Tyler Baltierra is on a one-man mission to reform adoption (and get his bio daughter Carly’s parents Brandon and Teresa Davis to resume contact with him). During one of his online rants on Monday, the ‘Teen Mom’ dad talked to fans about the trauma that placing first daughter Carly for adoption has caused his wife, Catelynn Lowell, as well as their daughter Carly, who is now 15 years old.
“I’m doing this because I feel, in my heart, that I have traumatized Carly,” he said. “I was ignorant, and I didn’t know anything about adoptees and what they experience, and I feel that she is owed this explanation. She deserves this information. She deserves this truth. She deserves to…have the freedom to express whatever feelings she has around it, without the influence of the adoptive parents and without the influence of the birth parents.”
Tyler then asked fans to have more compassionate for Catelynn. He began to tear up as he spoke about how awful it was to watch Catelynn have to give Carly to Brandon and Teresa at the age of 16.
“To think about my wife having to be rolled out of the hospital in a wheelchair as she’s still bleeding and holding [Carly]—” Tyler said before sobbing. “She was a child, rolling down the street, not even on hospital grounds… [She had] this expectation of having this access [to Carly] and this open adoption experience, and trusting all the adults that were around us, telling us, ‘This is the right thing’ and ‘You’re doing such a good job’ and ‘What a gift you’re giving these people.’ It just kills me. It literally kills me.
“And to know that trauma that Cate had to go through— not only at home before Carly was born– but afterwards, and she was by herself and there was no support. How is that OK?”
Tyler went on to applaud Catelynn for continuing to appear on ‘Teen Mom’ and show the birthparent perspective of adoption.
“And then for [Catelynn] to continue to share her story, being vulnerable,” he said. “And then, for me— being young and naive and not even understanding the trauma and PTSD that comes with being a birth mother– not even a birthparent, I’m a father and I didn’t carry this baby— for her to have this trauma in her body, and then to have it reignited after having Nova and then having post-partum depression and not understanding why all this is coming up for her.”
He then expressed regret for how he treated Catelynn during her battle with post-partum depression following Nova’s birth.
“I didn’t know that birth mothers go through this when they had [more] children after relinquishing their first one… I was so ignorant and I didn’t understand and there were times where I was frustrated and I didn’t understand,” he said. “I didn’t go about it the right way. I wish I would have been more supportive with her during all that. She got ridiculed by the public by going and getting help. And even I at that time didn’t understand.”
“So, for her to just continue to share her story, and to be so vulnerable and to take all the brunt of all of this— I don’t care what anybody says about her. I think she is the strongest woman I’ve ever met in my life,” Tyler said, before asking fans for “more grace and understanding” for his wife.
“At the end of the day, she was failed. People failed her,” he said. “People failed her being a young daughter and a child in a crisis. That’s crazy…This is a lot. But this is reality. This is adoption, which is loss and trauma at all sides. I just ask that people be compassionate. Try to understand.”
Tyler also spoke about how he and Cate had to battle their parents at the time of Carly’s adoption, as both Butch and April were against Carly being adopted.
“Me and Catelynn had to get guardian ad litem because we were minors,” Tyler said. “We technically couldn’t sign off on parental rights as minors without parental permission or whatever. We didn’t get that parent permission. Our parents actually fought us in court. They were withdrawn from drugs in the back of the courtroom trying to get us to stop doing what we were doing. So, we had to get guardian ad litem appointed to represent us.”
