After months of drama and headlines, Jenelle Evans and her husband, David Eason, finally regained custody of their kids. Eason shot and killed the family dog, Nugget, for allegedly nipping at his young daughter Ensley, and it prompted a slew of complaints and a CPS investigation. Evans was fired from Teen Mom 2 as a result of the animal cruelty, and once authorities stepped in, her kids were taken away.
Just this past week, Evans regained custody of her 5-year-old son Kaiser with ex-fiancé Nathan Griffith and 2-year-old daughter Ensley whom she shares with Eason. Evans' 9-year-old son Jace, who lives permanently with his grandmother, wasn't allowed in the home during the investigation, but that has now been lifted. Eason's 11-year-old daughter Maryssa, of whom he has full custody, was removed from the home as well, but is now back.
After the ruling, Evans released a statement that was a little strange to some people.
“I am ecstatic to regain custody of my kids back!" she said. "Throughout this long process and final decision, I am excited to be moving forward and continuing to show America I’m a good parent.”
Many fans found it weird that she was focused on proving to America that she's a good parent, rather than proving it to her kids, but that's neither here nor there.
Once the ruling came down, Griffith wasn't thrilled with the result. He was noticeably upset after Kaiser was returned to Evans, and even tweeted out a survey for complaints against the judge on the case.
"I've calm down a bit and just relying on my faith at this moment," he tweeted. "I'm not going to put my two cents in but if anyone wants to put their input, you can visit: https://survey.nccourts.org/1480690875 to complete a survey. Any input will help. The judge's name is Pauline Hankins. TY #TeamGriffith."
Other than the statement, Evans has been fairly silent about the whole thing. However, today she did a Q&A on her Instagram page that answered some questions that fans were curious about.
"How's everything been since having all the kids back? Does [Jace] get to live with y'all too?"
"Everything and everyone is doing great," Evans answered. "We are super grateful and happy. Jace will live with us full time soon but not now."
As mentioned, Jace currently lives full time with Evans' mom. The reality star wrote about this in her book, where she claimed that her mother tricked her into giving up custody of her son.
One night my mother convinced me to go out with my friends so I could relax," Evans wrote. "My mother. Wanted me to relax. I took the bait, however, and went out for the evening with Tori. My mother had called [Child Protective Services] and told them I was out partying all night and left my son at home. She told them I did this pretty much every night, which was a lie. I tried to tell them she told me to go out, but they wouldn't listen. They gave my mother temporary custody in light of my actions. My mother had set me up and I had fallen hard for it."
"Do you think you and Nathan should have split custody or keep it the same? Why/why not?"
"Keep it the way it is now," Evans said. "There's a lot of details behind why there is supervised visits with Nathan."
It's not really clear what Evans means by this, but Griffith's mom spoke out after Evans regained custody of Kaiser, saying her son was extremely upset and made it seem like Kaiser was in danger when he's with Evans and Eason.
"Nathan is an absolute wreck over this," Doris Davidson said. "He called me saying, 'Mom, I can not believe this.' Kaiser is so loved, sheltered and protected here, I felt like I was lying to him, when I told him I was going to protect him. I couldn't protect him. My heart is broken, its just broken...We are in shock, absolute shock, at the judge's decision."
"What's one thing you wish people would know about you?"
"I'm not as confrontational as people believe," Evans said.
This one is a little hard to believe, as once Evans literally drove after a guy a who cut her off and threatened him with a gun - all while Jace was in the car.
"How does it feel to have your kids ripped from your arms & everyone calling you a horrible mom?"
"Doesn't bother me what-so-ever because my babies are back in my arms," Evans wrote. "Obviously that goes to show that some of you believe anything you read online and don't know anything close to the truth."
I guess it's easy to say it doesn't bother you once they're back, but I can't imagine Evans wasn't bothered when she was going to court to fight for them back.
"What are your kids' favorite activity to do with you and your husband?"
"Jace loves to fish with David," Evans revealed. "Kaiser loves to play hunting outside, Maryssa does scuba a lot with him, and Ensley loves to swim/watch movies with him."
Evans is clearly trying to paint a picture of her husband that is much more kind than we know him to be. Eason has had a history of violence, and part of the reason the kids were taken away was the authorities believed he could be a danger to them due to his temper.
"Why are you acting like you and David are good parents?"
"It's not acting, it's facts," Evans bluntly put.
"Why should Nathan have supervised visits if he just kept [Kaiser] all that time alone? 50/50?"
"He didn't keep Kaiser alone, and if he did then he would be in contempt of the custody order," Evans pointed out. "But there's a lot of behind the scene details why it's supervised."
Again, it's not clear on what these "details" are, but clearly there's a big piece of the puzzle we're missing, or at least according to Evans there is.
"Will y'all consider letting [Maryssa] go to public school like the other kids?"
"Yes, she is going to," Evans said. "I do want to point out she wanted to try out homeschooling to begin with."
Maryssa is currently being home-schooled by her father, and it's unclear who homeschooled her when she was removed from the home.
"Do you still have an open CPS case or did they close out? Is court with them done?"
"Court is completely done with," Evans revealed. "The CPS case is dismissed. Everything they had as evidence was basically all hearsay."
It's hard to believe that a case full of hearsay would go on for two months, but until we hear otherwise, we only have Evans' word to go off.
"Will you get your turn to tell your side of things at some point?"
"Yes, I've been filming/documenting my experience through all of this," Evans wrote. "I will put it [all together] and let you guys see how my life was completely turned upside down soon."
Since Evans was fired from Teen Mom 2, there won't be any professionally filmed or documented footage of what went down, but it seems like Evans has things all sorted out.
"Is Nathan even allowed to share the complaint link he did yesterday?"
"IDK but he's really immature for posting that," Evans shared. "I've had many judges rule in a way that I didn't like and never once did I posted a bad thing about the judge on social media. I find it extremely disrespectful."
There probably isn't a rule about posting a complaint form against a judge, but this is a situation where I agree with Evans - it was pretty immature.
"Was it a hard decision to stay with David after the dog incident?"
"Honestly, yes," Evans admitted. "We were on bad terms for almost a week. Didn't talk much. He knows how upset it made me. Now that we are getting over this incident our relationship has got a lot stronger. David has completed anger management as well."
There were rumors that anger management was part of the court conditions before Evans and Eason could get their kids back, but that hasn't been confirmed. The fact that the bad terms only lasted a week is pretty shocking. If my husband shot and killed our dog it would take a lot longer than that for me to get over it, if I ever could.
Nathan's Girlfriend
Griffith's current girlfriend, Ashley Lanhardt, have never gotten along, and she made that even more clear during her Q&A. In a since-deleted tweet, Evans was asked "Genuine question, have you ever invited Nathan and Ashley to your place for Kaiser’s sake?" The question comes on the heels of Griffith and Lanhardt inviting Eason and Evans to Kaiser's 5th birthday party a few weeks back while Griffith had custody.
“Nope.. and there’s a damn good reason. As soon as Kaiser’s party was over Ashley had to go tweet some s**t about David but all nice to his face,” Jenelle tweeted, adding an emoji with rolling eyes. “Don’t trust her at all."
Evans continued in an Instagram story, referencing a post that Lanhardt must have made on her private Facebook account.
"There was no findings of abuse or neglect despite what Ashley Lanhardt has posted to her Facebook," Evans wrote. "I've known judge Hawkins for years and she is very fair with her rulings and you def don't want to go in front of her for criminal charges."
Lanhardt responded to Evans' post on Twitter, saying "TY Jenelle Evans / Eason, (whatever name you are using today) for the name drop. Sorry guys I only approve people I personally know on FB. Girl, you must have some amazing stalking skills to see my private Facebook. I stand by everything I have said/posted. Who’s more credible?"
In the end, it's up to the courts decide what's right for the children, and they seem to think returning them to Evans and Eason was the right call. That doesn't mean everyone will agree with it, though. It's interesting to hear all of Evans' answer, as it's the most she's spoken out about the situation in a while.
