Tyler Baltierra is addressing fans who tell him his biological daughter Carly will come back into his life once she turns 18 next year.
As ‘Teen Mom’ fans know, Tyler— along with his now-wife Catelynn Lowell— placed Carly for adoption at birth with Brandon and Teresa Davis. Tyler has been very outspoken against adoption in recent years, and has discussed the things he would have done differently with Carly if he could go back and change the past. (As The Ashley has previously reported, Brandon and Teresa closed Carly’s adoption in 2024, and Ty and Cate have not had contact with her since then.)
Despite this, Tyler had a rather surprising reaction to fans who recently told him that Carly “will be home soon” with him and Cate.
“I get the sentiment with your comment & appreciate it so much but she is home with her mother & father,” Tyler replied. (He later reposted the comment to his Instagram Stories earlier this week.) “All we hope is that she has happiness, good health & autonomy!”
Tyler reposted a second, similar comment— and his response to it. The fan pointed out that Carly will be 18 soon, and that her being an adult could mean she will want to reestablish a connection with Catelynn, Tyler and their daughters.
“In about 9 months, your oldest will be 18,” the person wrote. “Time will tell.”
“Regardless if she ever chooses to reunite [with us] or not, we will always grieve what we were never worthy of having,” Tyler responded. “I have peace & trust in her spiritual wisdom. As long as she is doing whatever her heart is telling her to do & following that intuition, then I will be cheering her on. Whether that includes me, my wife or just her sisters, or none of us at all. I will support her because I have & always will love her unconditionally.”
Despite Tyler and Catelynn speaking out frequently against adoption— and aspects of Carly’s adoption— Tyler has always maintained that he will be OK if Carly doesn’t want a relationship with him once she’s an adult. In recent years, he and Catelynn have stressed that they would like to at least know if Brandon and Teresa closed the adoption because it was what Carly wanted, or what they wanted as her parents.
During an episode of their Cate & Ty Break It Down! podcast from earlier this month, Tyler and Cate spoke with a marriage and family therapist (who is also an adoptee herself). During the three-part conversation, the topic of what might happen once Carly turns 18 was brought up.
“If she wants nothing to do with us that’s all we want,” he said during the podcast episode posted on September 8. “If she wants everything to do with us that’s all we want. If she wants only to have contact with her sisters and not us that’s all we want. We literally only want what she wants and I think at this point it’s our responsibility to grieve the decision that we made [to place her for adoption] and I don’t think Carly… owe[s] anyone anything.
“She doesn’t owe her parents anything; she doesn’t owe us anything,” he continued. “She owes everything to herself to stand firm in her command her place in the world. This is how I feel. [I want her to] have safety and freedom doing that and making that decision.”
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Tyler stressed that the lack of communication with Brandon and Teresa has made it hard for them to know what Carly actually wants.
“…we only want whatever she wants,” he said. “The only crappy part about it is it’s hard to know what she wants when we can’t communicate— not even with her. But that might change one day, you know, but to know what she wants would require communication for whoever advocates for her… it’s like, this could all be eliminated with communication and clarification.”
Tyler addressed the topic back in 2024, writing in the comment section of a post on the official ‘Teen Mom’ Instagram account that showed a ‘Teen Mom: The Next Chapter’ scene about Carly.
“Of course I’d LOVE for her to be in our lives more & her sisters’ lives,” he wrote at the time. “The truth is, she might turn 18 & want nothing to do with us. It just might be too difficult for her or she simply might just want to move on with her life & not have us be involved…& ya know what? That’s OKAY! That is her right! That is her choice!
“Or she might want to just talk us one final time & tell us how much our decision to place her has negatively affected her or traumatized her life…& that’s OKAY! I would humbly fold my hands behind my back, lower my head & allow her to yell, cry, or scream at me if that’s what she needs. All I would say is ‘I’m sorry. You’re right. I love you.’”
Carly will turn 18 in May 2027.
RELATED STORY: ‘Teen Mom’ Star Tyler Baltierra & Dr. Kristen Kirkland Discuss How Similar Infant Adoption is to Human Trafficking
What if Carly shows up at 18 and tells Tyler she wants him and his wife to never talk about her and her parents online ever again… would Tyler still want what she wants?
At that point he and Catelynn will start crying about how Carly was “brainwashed” by Brandon and Teresa.
And there we have it. We knew all along their fans are delusional but I think this is where they come from thinking they “DESERVE” time with her. Look, I still think it was Carly who didn’t want to talk to them anymore (at the end of the day, they are strangers to her, she saw them like once a year) and they just can’t handle it their OWN CHILD (in their words) doesn’t want to talk to them. Well, guess what. When you signed your rights to her, she became Brandon and Theresa’s child (I’m not even gonna start Tyler banging on about how esp Theresa needed therapy before adopting cuz it makes my blood boil), they are her PARENTS. Get it through your thick (and your fans’).
I REALLY dislike how they are still using her for content and staying relevant. I’m sure she knows about this and therefore decided to cut contact. Plus, you have three girls at home (one needs her help too) so just focus on them and please jsut shut the f up! (Your girls will start to resent you too, Vaeda is already old enough)
They stopped communicating Thank you because u acted like a dick! I’d have cut u off also!
Newsflash: teenagers these days can get in contact with you in a million ways if they WANT TO! I have no doubt C&T’s antics creeped Carly out, and SHE is the one who wants no contact. Then there’s the fact that C&T have been using Carly to MAKE MONEY online, and they’ve been violating her privacy for her WHOLE LIFE! I think Carly’s horrified by the whole OFans thing, too! CREEPY!!
Does anyone actually believe that Carly wants contact with Catelynn and Tyler, and is being denied by her parents? At 17 years old? How would that even work with a 17 year old in the year 2026? Also, I’m an adoptive parent. Trust me, we all have a fear that we could lose our children to their birth parents when they turn 18. We aren’t going to all but ensure that happens by denying them any type of contact, if that’s what they want.
Tyler loves to believe that he is an open-minded, reasonable, zen creature of Earth, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. If he truly wanted “whatever Carly wants”, he would have left things alone instead of communicating with a minor friend of Carly’s for months.
It makes no sense that B&T get to have their way with no contact when C&T parent’s did not get the same respect from them or the agency and took their grandchild from minor kids. Same age as Carley. They have a right to grieve the loss. It is loss. This notion that birth parent’s are nobly sacrificing the baby for the baby’s good and will ride off into the sunset never to think on it or want for their child is fantasy. This couple should never have been matched with the pair. This never looked like an adoption should in their era of adoption.
I think Carley will contact them after college, perhaps when married.
Tyler told Cait, if she kept the baby, he’d be gone.
They signed away all and any rights, she’s no longer their daughter ( other than being biological , that’s where it ends)
She’s Brandon and teresa’s daughter, they have shown more than enough respect to this two.
And in return they got nothing but disrespect from c&t.
For years B&T were angels from above, amazing etc.
Then when things don’t go c&t’s way( which was all their fault things went south) they are now bad mouthing B&T.
If I were Carly’s parents ( B&T) I’d be taking out an injunction order and a c&d on those two.
Let’s have the alcoholic and drug addicts make the decisions for an infant. Listen to yourself. You want APRIL and BUTCH to have respect and not their grandchild taken from them? You want Tyler’s mom, who by the way, wanted Tyler to choose adoption, to have respect? Get real and put the child first.
It makes no sense that Brandon and Teresa get to have their way with no contact… umm they are Carly’s parents so riddle me how it makes no sense… They had an adoption agreement that started they only had to allot visits and pictures up to the age of 5 and they went above and beyond that and made their boundaries very clear, which Catelynn and Tyler disrespected on numerous occasions.
And you want to take pity on April, Butch, and Kim? Well gee Butch was in and out of prison for several years, including serving 4 years in part to beating up on April. April is a drunk and was actually drunk during a visit WITH Carly. And Kim wanted the adoption… but oh yes please let’s take pity on them…
That is actually a valid point. April did tell Dawn, Brandon, and Theresa that she didn’t want them communicating with her daughter and that she did not want Caitlyn to be involved with them. All three adults ignored what April said and continued their communication with an underage girl. Ultimately entering into a legally binding contract with her.
Under normal circumstances, maybe this would be a valid point. But, April was an abusive drug addict who had only just regained custody of Caitlyn. April is a big reason why Caitlyn even considered adoption. I don’t know that forcing a teenager to parent a baby because her abusive addict mom said so is the right argument.
Opened adoption is NOT a legal binding contract.
And it was supposed to end when she turned 5
First of all, It’s hard to believe that Tyler would be that perfect since he’s never shown himself to be perfect, but okay. I hope he’s true to his word. I also don’t think there’s anything to be gained by knowing who put a stop to communication. It’s Brandon and Theresa’s job to protect their daughter, therefore well within their rights to exercize their best judgment. I don’t think it will benefit Tyler to know whether it was Carly or her parents.
It’s interesting how he swings wildly from side to side. He says this but then he had that podcast episode where he and a “doctor” likened adoption to human trafficking…… pick a mood Tyler and stick with it for more than 5 seconds. As we all know, he did a lot of damage to Carly with all the BS him and Catelynn said the last couple of years. So if Carly doesn’t reach out, he needs to take some responsibility for his actions. There’s such a disconnect to the things he says.
I think his moods have changed and his attitudes have changed as he has grown up. it may seem like he’s swinging wildly to us cause we’ve just seen it. I know this is probably not a popular opinion, but in hindsight this should not have been an open adoption unless it was very clear to the teenagers what that meant. I didn’t notice it at the time, but looking back they did not understand emotionally that they needed to be more detached from the biological child. they didn’t have the emotional maturity to realize that they had no claim to her.
As they got older they processed it in the public eye and they reacted to it with the maturity of a couple of teenagers who came from unstable backgrounds. I guess it was inevitable that the adoptive parents were going to have to put up some firewalls to allow their daughter to grow up without all that chaos especially when you add in the grandparents. Maybe some therapy is helping them see that they have to let their first born do her own thing and that may be never reaching out to them.
They’ve certainly had the time and resources (therapy) to come to this conclusion, but this is a very recent development.
I’d be thrilled if they were sincere about finally letting her go, but they’re STILL talking about her (using her for profit).
If they have grown and matured and mean what they say, they will mercifully stop mentioning her name and let that poor girl live her best life, unfettered by their hopes, dreams and expectations.
ngl those “carly will go back to catelynn and tyler as soon as she turns 18” comments have always been mad weird, im glad he did one thing right and straightened those weirdos out that brandon and teresa ARE carly’s mom and dad