Dedicated viewers launched their own investigation in 2020, when Myka and James Stauffer suddenly stopped featuring their son in vlogs over two years after adopting him from China.
In the new docuseries An Update on Our Family, Vox Media Studios revisited the entire Stauffer scandal, including the moment eagle-eyed followers found a reason to believe the couple was hiding something about then-4-year-old Huxley, who has since been renamed by his new family.
In April 2020, James posted footage from the inside of his car on his auto maintenance YouTube channel, Stauffer Garage. Followers were quick to observe that Huxley’s carseat was missing from the backseat.
The Stauffers’ subscribers also flagged that comments about Huxley’s absence were being deleted, and their suspicions were heightened when Myka and James changed their videos with the toddler from public to private. All of their content featuring Huxley was suddenly unavailable.
The Ohio parents followed their period of silence with a confessional video sharing that they decided to place Huxley — who was diagnosed with autism — with a new family that could properly cater to his special needs.
The Stauffers, as well as Huxley’s new family, have not responded to PEOPLE’s requests for comment.
After they revealed their decision to seek out adoption dissolution, the Stauffers’ lawyers spoke to PEOPLE about their ultimate hope to “provide Huxley with the best possible treatment and care”.
“We are privy to this case and given the facts at hand, we feel this was the best decision for Huxley,” Myka and James’ lawyers, Thomas Taneff and Taylor Sayers, told PEOPLE in an exclusive statement issued in May 2020. “In coming to know our clients we know they are a loving family and are very caring parents that would do anything for their children.”
“Since his adoption, they consulted with multiple professionals in the healthcare and educational arenas in order to provide Huxley with the best possible treatment and care,” Taneff and Sayers continued. “Over time, the team of medical professionals advised our clients it might be best for Huxley to be placed with another family.”
The vloggers’ legal team noted that the Stauffers followed the advice of medical professionals, which, the lawyers clarified, “did NOT include any considerations for placement in the foster system, but rather to hand-select a family who is equipped to handle Huxley’s needs.”
In response to widespread backlash, Myka deleted her personal YouTube channel and family channel, The Stauffer Life, from the video-sharing platform. She shared a lengthy statement on her Instagram in June 2020, which marked her final public activity on social media.
In her instagram post, Myka apologized “for the uproar” that followed after she and her husband James announced their adoption dissolution.
“This decision has caused so many people heart break and I’m sorry for letting down so many women that looked up to me as a mother,” Myka wrote at the time, adding that she took “full responsibility” for the “hurt” she caused.
She continued, “I’m sorry for the confusion, and pain I have caused, and I am sorry for not being able to tell more of my story from the beginning. I could have never anticipated the incidents which occurred on a private level to ever have happened, and I was trying my best to navigate the hardest thing I have ever been through.”
