Amber Portwood‘s relationship with her first baby daddy Gary Shirley has gone south, but coparenting with her other baby daddy, Andrew Glennon, is moving in a (surprisingly) good direction.
“Our communication has improved dramatically. We are able to be on the same page for the sake of our son,” Andrew told Us Weekly on Friday.
Andrew— whom shares six-year-old son James with Amber— spoke to the magazine about the positive turn his relationship with Amber has taken in recent times. As Teen Mom fans are aware, Amber and Andrew had an extremely tumultuous breakup that ended with Amber being arrested for domestic battery in 2019. Following their breakup, Amber and Andrew had a very public, bitter fight over custody of James, who ended up moving to California with Andrew in 2022, despite Amber protesting the move.
In 2023, Andrew filed an emergency motion to suspend Amber’s parenting time with James, after concerns about her mothering were raised.
However, it appears that things with the exes are much better these days. In fact, Andrew even sang Amber’s praises as a mother in his new interview. Despite Amber residing in Indiana and James living in California, Andrew said that Amber is an active mom to James.
“[James and Amber] are in constant communication, daily Facetiming and lots of calls,” he said before calling Amber a “loving, caring and present” mom to James.
Andrew also addressed recent claims that Amber is battling Baby Daddy No. 1, Gary, who reportedly states that Amber hasn’t paid him child support for their 16-year-old daughter Leah for years.
Andrew disputed the claims, telling the magazine that he personally witnessed Amber paying Gary child support while they were together.
“Normally I wouldn’t get involved in these types of matters as I like living a private life,” Andrew said. “But it felt like the right thing to do since I witnessed Amber paying him large amounts of money numerous times, specifically for child support.”
As The Ashley reported last month, the upcoming season of Teen Mom: The Next Chapter will show the once-strong co-parenting relationship of Gary and Amber disintegrate, reportedly over Gary’s claims that Amber owes him years’ worth of child support payments. Gary is reportedly considering taking Amber to court to get the back payments he says she owes. Amber, however, has disputed Gary’s claims, with a source close to Amber telling Us Weekly recently that Amber has “receipts” for payments made to Gary for child support.
(On a recent TikTok Live session, Amber quickly addressed Gary’s claims, telling her fans it’s “not true” and that she pays her child support.)
According to Andrew– who, admittedly hasn’t been with Amber in five years— Amber would pay Gary for Leah’s care.
“My reaction was that it was not true,” he said. “I regularly witnessed Amber paying throughout our relationship. Oftentimes, I would go with her to hand-deliver the funds.”
(Interestingly, Gary actually testified in support of Amber back in March 2022 during Amber’s custody court battle with Andrew over James. Gary told the judge that Amber was a much-better person and mother than she was when he was in a relationship with her years before, and that he was “proud” of her for making such positive changes.)
According to court records pulled by The Ashley, Gary and Amber settled their custody dispute in court in 2016. On May 13, 2016, it was decided that Amber and Gary would share joint legal custody of Leah, but that Gary would maintain primary physical custody. Amber was ordered to pay Gary $1200 a month in child support. (As of press time, no new court cases have been filed in regard to child support for Amber and Gary.)
The child support battle will be addressed on upcoming episodes of ‘Teen Mom: The Next Chapter.’ It’s likely that Amber’s very strained relationship with Leah will also be addressed.
Amber and Leah have not had a good relationship over the past few years, with their mother/daughter dynamic arguably reaching a new low last season when a family birthday dinner for Leah ended with the teen in tears after Amber called her a “d**k”, among other things.
On TikTok Live recently, Amber revealed that Gary has informed her that she is no longer “allowed to come get” Leah.
Gary has yet to publicly address the situation or respond to Andrew’s comments.
(Photos: MTV)
26 Responses
Next we’ll be hearing from Matt Baier about “what a damn good mom Amber is”.
Gary taking all the blame when we know Leah is old enough to voice her boundaries and not wanting to be around her mom. Can’t say I blame her.
It’s a lot easier to be a “present” parent for a 6 year old who lives a thousand miles away than a 16 year old who lives across town. James doesn’t have any demands or expectations. It doesn’t take much to impress a small child and have them adore you. A teenage who has been dealing with your bs her whole life isn’t going to be easily impressed.
And, Andrew has no clue about the child support payments when he hasn’t been with Amber for 5 years.
I assume he’s getting something out of this interview. Either money from Amber or possible screen time.
So Andrew is broke and wants top be featured on the show. Is that right? Just sayin. Amber hasn’t paid for child supportfor Leah but she has paid child support for james? Weird.
Andrew and Amber haven’t been together in 5 years….how would he know if Amber is paying child support or not? He’s been in California for a year or two, while Amber’s in Indiana (most of the time).
Is Andrew going to discuss all the urination claim Amber made against him)? She reported Andrew peed on the carpets of her home, after she moved back in from the rental (after Andrew moved out).
I read and reread “urination” thinking I was reading it wrong or you wrote it wrong. I thought there’s no way you meant to write URINATION. But then I kept reading and it made sense LoL. I totally forgot about that and feel like people didn’t make a big deal about it. Like peeing all over the floor isn’t completely insane or something.
So Andrew wants to be featured on the show?
As a person who has an Indiana child support case I do know for a fact that the state will only disburse payments only for the amount your allowed every month & only pay child support to the custodial parent for exactly 52 weeks nothing more. If Amber was not paying child support the state is obligated to go after her & they would have already especially if it were years. Its not like Amber is a hard person to track down so I don’t believe Gary.
I’m also in indiana and my friends ex husband hasn’t paid a dime in years, and no one has gone after him.
You can get the state involved for child support purposes. Where I live in Indiana, it went just fine and I got what was due to me. If I am not mistaken, you can get charged with a felony if you owe over a certain amount.
As a person who also has experience with Indiana child support….I’m calling shenanigans.
What the “authorities” (not actually a law, btw) say….. “we will go after you if you don’t pay”…and what really happens are two very, very different things. If the custodial parent does not pursue the case, the court most certainly isn’t obligated, nor are they likely, to pursue it independently, even if such a law were factual. It can be hard as hell to get support payments even when you take the proper steps.
What you’re talking about are payments that the court has already pursued at the request of a custodial parent (typically through multiple appearances, mind you) and has GARNERED the wages/income (including tax refunds, etc.) of a non-custodial parent for back payments, while still expecting them to keep up to date on current payments. When they fail to keep current, the court CAN adjust the wages garnished to compensate for that (but this requires more multiple missed payments). I don’t know where you got the 52 weeks thing, as it has nothing at all to do with anything, unless the garnishment itself is to compensate for 52 weeks of missed payments. But that would be very case specific and again, has nothing at all to do with anything, the number is only indicative of the payments missed/not fulfilled completely and it’s an individual case thing.
I 100% believe Gary, Amber has already admitted several times in the past that she is not, nor has she ever been, current on support payments. This is the first time she’s ever actually denied it. Hell it was on the show, lmao.
Dude just admitted he hasn’t been with her in 5 years, so it’s very possible that yes, while with him she did pay but between that time & 5 years later.. those payment have stopped…
Amber makes a show when she’s with a guy of “i provide & care for my daughter” but when the guy is gone she isn’t interested in Leah, let’s be real, ever since Leah got old enough to hold Amber accountable for her parenting, Amber isn’t interested. Leah is now at the stage where she’s asking Amber those tough questions “well why did you do this?, why do you pick these people over me?” Etc etc. Amber is a classic narcissist. The best thing Leah can do is be legally adopted by Kristina, that’s the mom she knows & loves, who’s raised her & been there for the good & the bad.
Amber’s relationship with Leah will only her worse as the years go on until Leah eventually cuts her off permanently & then she’ll play the victim some more. She needs to be let go from the show, people need to stop enabling her behaviour. Keep Gary on the show, let’s get his POV & their wee family. Ditch Amber.
I wonder how much she paid him for this.
Andrew is irrelevant. He hasn’t been with her for 5 years, so how can he say it’s not true lol? He has no idea!
Andrew much prefers getting checks from Amber to getting an actual job, so of course he is going to defend her. How else is he going to stay on the QAnon message boards all night in his tighty whities and tinfoil hat?
No Andrew has a job, remember he’s a “day trader”, just using Amber’s CS to “day trade”.
lol.
His mom (who he and James live on her property) is rich af. Millionaire status. Ik, weird since he acts like trash. Money doesn’t buy class
Andrew hasn’t been with Amber in 5 years. He knows nothing about how much she owes Gary from 2019 to the present day.
Also it wouldn’t surprise me that this issue isn’t completely real and instead it’s a half truth for the upcoming season. Amber (and by addition, Gary) has no plotline whatsoever. She doesn’t have custody of her kids, she doesn’t even see them, she’s not in a relationship anymore, she doesn’t have a job, she doesn’t go to school, she doesn’t have a business. They need SOMETHING to talk about.
You haven’t been together for years. So what you witnessed has absolutely no relevance to what Gary is saying. And if you really love the “private life” why are you giving interviews? Bell*nd
how dumb do they think we are? idk about now because both gary & amber seem to be speaking their truths but i remember when amber & andrew started dating and gary even mentioned to amber how she’s been behind on child support and she responded back that she knows she is and she’ll make up the payments so the payments he “personally” saw her do was probably for that and even then they weren’t even together that long to begin with 😂
Andrew said he witnessed Amber write checks to Gary, and I don’t doubt be did, bit correct me if I’m wrong, but Gary is suing for last year’s support and Andrew and Amber broke up more than a year ago
Didn’t take much for Andrew to be snowed again. Amber is manipulative. She blames everything and everyone for shit she does. Before we start talking about what “a loving, caring and present mom” she is he needs to think about the fact that she chased Andrew with a machete with James in his arms. What would have happened if Andrew couldn’t get away fast enough to lock himself and James in the closet? (The same closet that had machete marks on the doorknob because she was trying to break in) James would have been hacked to death with a machete. But hey as long as Amber is playing nicey nice now all is forgiven and forgotten.🤷🏼♀️
I’m sure amber called him playing the victim and saying she’s being bullied online. It’s like she has to play nice with one at a time. Pathetic
Kind of like Kail. Whenever one of her baby daddies is on the outs, she suddenly has a greatly improved relationship with another one.
I will believe Gary 1000% before I ever believe Amber & the people she can pay to say good things about her. Was Andrew threatened with the machete to say something nice?
But also, what a slap in the face of Leah to be trumpeting out there how her non-involved mom is constantly on calls and FaceTime with the other child. That statement alone (let alone the whole irrelevant character witness Andrew felt compelled to give ) made me cringe for Leah.