Catelynn Lowell and Tyler Baltierra have made some mistakes.
But, they say, they felt backed into a corner — and may have been tricked by someone preying upon their desperation.
After Catelynn and Tyler’s scandal in which they appeared to be messaging a teenage friend of Carly’s, they’re speaking out.
They regret it. But they also believe that a grown adult was catfishing them.
In 2024, Brandon and Teresa Davis cut off all contact between 16-year-old Carly and her birth parents.
Tyler Baltierra and Catelynn Lowell have not taken it well. Their distress is understandable.
However, the couple began to share messages with someone — allegedly a teenage friend of Carly.
Earlier this year, those messages leaked online.
Tyler and Cat were clearly trying to get information, ostensibly from a teen, about their daughter. It set off alarm bells and ignited a scandal.
During the Wednesday, October 15 episode of the Cate & Ty Break It Down! podcast, Tyler and Catelynn discussed these conversations.
One major takeaway is that they admit that they were wrong to take this approach. They should not have messaged this person.
“Full accountability for being wrong,” Tyler affirmed.
The other major takeaway is that they do not believe that this person was actually a teenage friend of Carly’s.
Catelynn and Tyler believe that someone with extensive knowledge of the adoption and more was catfishing them. But why?
Catelynn Lowell and Tyler Baltierra believe that whoever it was could only fool them in this way because they felt such desperation.
“If we had access to information [about Carly], none of this would have happened,” Tyler argued.
“I still, to this day, [believe] it’s somebody who knows her, it’s somebody who’s involved in the community,” Catelynn emphasized.
“Nobody else would know these things [about Carly] that this person knew,” she suggested.
So when she was telling us these scary things [about Carly’s life] that we were nervous about,” Catelynn reasoned, “part of you is like, ‘I need to know more information to see if this is fully true.’”
“Should we have? It’s kind of hard because I couldn’t get a hold of [Carly’s parents],” Tyler suggested. “If I could have talked to her parents, this would have never happened!”
He also shared that they had heard some alarming things about the evangelical Christian community in which Carly is growing up.
“You can’t fight your parental instincts to protect,” Tyler claimed.
“In the end it just comes down to that fear, that desperation to make sure that everything [with Carly] was safe and good,” he added.
To be fair, anyone who has grown up in an insular evangelical community or knows someone who grew up that way can understand their fear. But not, perhaps, the lines crossed along the way.
“For the normal person who is not involved in the dynamic of adoption, yeah, [what we did] is going to look f–king crazy,” Catelynn Lowell admitted, noting that she and Tyler Baltierra share”that PTSD of relinquishment.”
Just for the record, the scenario that they’re describing does sound very alarming. But there are some major issues.
One, they got caught. As such, this podcast episode would have been better with fewer explanations.
Two, it is so transparent that they are seeing Carly as their daughter. We get that. But the very nature of adoption means that, in this case, she is not. This is a painful situation and a reminder that teenager should not be having kids.
And three … folks, if you’re worried about someone and you have any financial resources to speak of, the solution isn’t to embarrass yourself by DMing an alleged teenager who may or may not be inside a scary subculture.
Private detectives aren’t just part of noir films. And they aren’t just for cheating spouses and messy divorces. You can quietly hire an actual expert to check on someone’s well being.