Kailyn Lowry is a mom again!
The “Teen Mom” alum and her boyfriend Elijah Scott secretly welcomed their first and her fifth child together last year.
Lowry announced the news on her “Barely Famous” podcast, sharing a first photo of their son on Instagram.
On the podcast, she called his birth “traumatizing,” sharing, “He had to go right to the NICU. I got to maybe hold him for three seconds when they took him to the NICU.”
The reality star continued, “I was so upset. I was beside myself. It was so scary. I have pictures of all the nurses in the hospital room at the time, just hands on Rio. It was probably, like, six of them.”
Lowry said she hoped to dedicate an upcoming episode to his birth story.
Meanwhile, she also opened up to People magazine about the announcement.
“I wanted to be able to tell my own story on my own terms and kind of share what information I wanted to share instead of being within a contractual obligation or storyline,” she said.
Kailyn, who also appeared on “16 and Pregnant,” explained that her personal news “was ripped out from under me time and time again. I kind of feel like my hands are tied. People are announcing it for me and so, at this point, I might as well just talk about it.”
She added, “At this point, I can at least try to do it my way.”
Kailyn explained that their “close circle, our family and our close friends all obviously knew” about Rio, and they even had a baby shower.
Despite their secrecy, there was a “leak from the hospital” and “that was definitely one of the sadder moments.”
The 31-year-old is already the mother of Isaac, 13, Lincoln, 9, Lux, 6, and Creed, 3. She said of welcoming another, “Do you ever really become a parenting expert? Because every child is so different and every experience is so different. I definitely would not consider myself an expert, but I’ve been around the block a couple of times with kids. I feel like every experience is so new that I wouldn’t say I’m an expert.”
This time around, she shared, “I’m adjusting accordingly. It’s an adjustment not having cameras around all the time. And it’s weird because it still feels like it’s a part of my life because it wasn’t that far away. It wasn’t.
“I’m trying to just get used to the normalcy and being able to go out and kind of move around and move about freely, run my errands freely, schedule appointments freely. That’s been nice. And I’ll just stay busy with motherhood and the podcast.”
Kailyn had previously hinted at having her fifth child over the summer on an episode of her “Baby Mamas No Drama with Kail Lowry & Vee Rivera” podcast. At the time, she told her guest Aurora Culpo that she watched her show “The Culpo Sisters” while she was in labor in November 2022.
Lowry had her fourth child, Creed, in July 2020.