Love Is Blind Tyler Francis finally addressed the paternity scandal surrounding the season 7 star and wife Ashley Adionser during the Wednesday, October 30, reunion.
“Those kids, that family, they did not sign up for this. So what is happening now is I try to keep that from happening. Their birth certificates are online. Things that shouldn’t be happening are now happening,” Tyler, 35, said during the season 7 reunion after Vanessa Lachey asked him to clear up the paternity drama. “And to get into the story, I did help a friend and her wife start a family, but her wife ended up leaving her and left her high and dry.”
He continued, “This was my very close friend. So I stepped in, voluntarily stepped in and helped. So there is pictures of me around. You’ll see me around. I’ve spent holidays with all my friends, you know, all their kids. And I played a part that became very shaky with a friend.”
“There’s no rule books to this. There’s no set lines to this,” Tyler added. “But I do want to let people know, Ashley knows all this. This is news to the world. This has never been news to us.”
Tyler became emotional as costar Garrett Josemans showed him support. “I don’t owe anyone an explanation but my wife,” Tyler said. He and Ashley, 32, confirmed they are still going strong one year after tying the knot during the season 7 finale.
In a sneak preview trailer that dropped two days prior to the reunion airing, it seemed that Ashley, 32, and Tyler, 35, appeared to be working things out together.
“Who has better insight on what’s going on? Social media or me?” Ashley asked, while Tyler later admitted, “I don’t owe anyone an explanation but Ashley.”
Tyler and Ashley tied the knot in the October 23 finale, despite the fact that he waited to tell her that he fathered three children until episode 9 of Love Is Blind. The season was filmed in October 2023, while the reunion taped one year later.
The account executive told his future bride that he was a sperm donor for a couple he knew and was the biological father of two girls and a boy.
The following day after Ashley had time to absorb the news, she told Tyler, “I’m not upset by you trying to help a couple have kids. I think that’s admirable in certain ways, but the issue comes in with me feeling like I was not getting the full picture of you.”
“Once you’re not given the full picture of something, it’s hard not to question everything. Me being a single woman before this, to come into this scenario and fall in love with a guy who has three sperm babies, sperm-donor babies, is a lot to absorb,” she added.
The duo went ahead with their wedding. After the ceremony, Ashley gushed, “I’m looking forward to daily simple things with you,” while Tyler added, “Just little things that makes her happy, weekly, monthly…”
“Then that builds up and then before we know it,” he continued, before Ashley finished his sentence, “Kids.”
Love Is Blind season 7 dropped on Netflix on October 2. Several days later, TikTok blogger Storytimewithrikkii shared a video alleging Tyler was the father of three kids “and he scrubbed them from his Instagram entirely when he found out he was gonna be on the show.”
She went on to claim that his 7-year-old son and twin 5-year-old daughters were conceived with Tyler as the sperm donor, but “he is very active in their lives.”
The children’s mother, Bri Thomas, came forward to slam Tyler’s claim that he was simply a “sperm donor” in an October 10 Instagram post.
“Yes, I am the mother of Tyler’s three children. I’m trying really hard to do this the right way, but I have no understanding why he would characterize his relationship with his children as he has,” she wrote. “I guess I have to speak on this, despite trying so hard not to. ‘Sperm babies’ they are not.”
A few hours later, Bri shared then deleted a holiday video where a little boy could be heard calling Tyler “dad,” explaining it was taken around Christmas 2022. “My children love their ‘Dad.’ To think that he has reduced them to ‘sperm babies,’ when I was told he was going on the show to be able to better provide for them,” she wrote.
According to Bri, her son was conceived via sperm donation while she was married to her ex-wife, Daeshon. Following her divorce, Bri said she and Tyler conceived the twins as a result of “natural unplanned intercourse with absolutely no complexity surrounding parentage.”
Ashley seemingly defended Tyler in the comments of an October 24 Instagram post, where a user left the comment, “I hope you never need egg donation. It’s not cool to make someone feel bad about it — it’s just genetic material, it’s not paternity.”
“Did you hear the part where I say, ‘I’m not mad at him trying to help a couple start a family…in fact I find it to be admirable!’” the marketing expert responded. “I would NEVER EVER demean anything about a woman’s fertility.”
In another comment Ashley explained, “I was upset that he didn’t share it with me sooner. I’d love to open this dialogue further. But for now I’ll say it’s more complicated when you donate to friends and family.”
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