Amber Portwood … well, let’s be honest, nobody’s going to be giving her any Mother of the Year awards anytime soon.
Things may be different with her second child, but she’s been a parent to Leah for nearly ten years now, and honestly, it hasn’t been great.
If you’ve watched any Teen Mom episode throughout the years, you’ve probably noticed that the woman just doesn’t seem to have any maternal instincts whatsoever.
In the early seasons of the show, we saw Amber scream and fight with Gary in front of baby Leah on several occasions, so much that child protective services got involved at one point.
Some might say she neglected Leah — and remembering all those scenes when she was left alone to cry in a crib without sheets, comforted by only a bottle of Kool-Aid …
We’ve heard more outlandish accusations, we’ll say that much.
Amber has admitted that she was a hardcore drug addict until she went to prison, and when she was released, she focused on her relationship with Matt Baier instead of her relationship with Leah.
For several years now, Gary has had custody, and Amber has really never made a real effort to change that, though that’s probably for the best.
Gary and his wife Kristina have been able to provide a stable, loving environment for Leah, one that it’s hard to imagine Amber could have created herself.
When she does see Leah, things seem tense and awkward — for example, that time when she cried and tried to guilt her for making a Christmas ornament for Gary and not for her.
It’s just a bad situation, and it got worse when this current season of Teen Mom OG began airing, when we saw that she’s barely been spending any time at all with her kid lately.
She could have spent a bunch of quality time with her daughter during her summer vacation last year, but she said she was too depressed to even see her.
However, she wasn’t too depressed to start dating Andrew Glennon and get pregnant!
Look, we could sit here all day and discuss Amber’s shortcomings as a mother, but we’ve got a brand new interview from her to go over, so let’s go ahead and jump into that, OK?
Besides, it all ties together pretty well.
To kick things off, Amber discussed her current custody agreement with Gary, explaining that Leah is “getting older and it’s coming to the point where she kind of decides when she wants to go back and forth and what she wants to do, which is a great thing.”
“It’s easier that way, you know?”
She said that “some weekends she wants to go and spend the night with her friends or do something else,” but “she’s a kid so I can’t really get mad at that.”
“But I do miss her a lot and I do explain to her that, even though she’s young, ‘Mommy still wants to see you more’ and things like that. She understands, but she’s a kid.”
So basically Leah still lives with Gary, and she’s deciding she doesn’t want to spend so much time with Amber?
Sad, but fair.
Next, Amber discussed her current co-parenting relationship with Gary and how he gets along with Andrew — thankfully, she said that “there’s no fighting” between them.
“Andrew just wants me to be happy and when he sees Gary saying certain things and I’m crying or I’m really sad about it … it hurts him and it does make him angry, but he stays out of it as much as he can because it’s not really his place to be in between that,” she explained.
She added that he’s “really protective over me especially now that I’m pregnant,” that he’s “super protective over how I feel, so he doesn’t appreciate the things that [Gary] says about me because he feels like he knows me better because, you know, being with me every day.”
Gary has known Amber for well over a decade and they were together on and off for years, but sure, this guy who creeped his way into her life less than a year ago knows her better.
But hey, what’s all this about Gary making her cry?
One of the things she had trouble with was an earlier episode when Kristina made a remark about adopting Leah, which she said was “ludicrous and absolutely ridiculous.”
“I would understand a comment like that if I was an addict again or if I was doing something in my life that was outrageous,” she admitted. “However, I don’t think falling in love with somebody is something that’s outrageous.”
“People do it all the time, you know. It’s really hurtful that they connected with me not seeing Leah because of my depression to me being with Andrew.”
She added that “it’s hurtful and it also makes me angry to make me think they’re talking behind my back like that as though I’m just a mom who doesn’t care about my child which is absolutely absurd.”
… OK, Amber. OK.
