“Untold: The Girlfriend Who Didn’t Exist” — a two-part documentary that explores the Manti Te’o catfishing saga through the eyes of Te’o and the perpetrator — has become a Netflix hit. Just over a week after its premiere, the documentary is the second most popular movie on the streaming platform.
Throughout the two-hour runtime, Te’o revisits the bizarre incident that upended his football career, sharing how he has worked through the trauma and come to peace with it all over the past decade.
Te’o, a Heisman Trophy candidate and star linebacker for Notre Dame, became the center of a media firestorm in 2013 when it was revealed that his girlfriend, Lennay Kekua — who had purportedly died of leukemia — did not really exist and was actually the social media creation of Naya Tuiasosopo, who has since come out as a trans woman.
Since the documentary’s release, Te’o has thanked fans for their support and opened up about his life today — including the news that he and his wife, Jovi Nicole, are expecting a son.
Manti Te’o thanks fans for support following Netflix documentary
Te’o recently appeared on “CBS Mornings” and revealed that the idea to open up about his story initially came when he attended a Jay-Z concert in 2017.
“At that concert, Jay-Z opens with saying these words, ‘You cannot heal what you don’t reveal.’ And it may have been just some random words to everybody, but for me, at that time, it hit me like a ton of bricks,’” Te’o said, according to Pop Sugar. “In order for me to kind of heal from this, I needed to reveal it.”
Since his story hit Netflix on Aug. 16, the former Notre Dame star said the support his fans have shown has been “humbling.”
“I just want to come on here real quick, just to give a heartfelt thank you to everybody that has come through and has shown so much love to me and my family, for your messages, for your comments,” Te’o said in an Instagram video, which has more than 115,000 likes. “I’m trying to go through all of them, and it’s been so amazing to me to hear the battles that we’re all facing, the challenges that we’re facing in our lives at this time, and how the documentary has given some of us hope, the extra push just to keep going.
“If there’s anything that I wanted from this thing was to give some of us hope who needed it, to tell those who needed some love that they’re loved, and to help them to forgive, to forgive others, and, most importantly, to forgive themselves,” he continued. “It’s just been so humbling just the amount of love that has been shown the past few days.”
Who is Manti Te’o’s wife?
In his recent appearance on “CBS Mornings,” Te’o also talked about his life today — including the announcement that he and his wife are expecting their second child.
“I’m a loving husband, I’ve got a great wife, I have a daughter and we have a son on the way,” Te’o said in the interview, which his wife shared on Instagram.
Te’o and his wife, Jovi Nicole Engbino, were first linked in 2016, the New York Post reported. The couple married in 2020, and Te’o shared a post of gratitude about his wife a couple of months into their marriage.
“My wife. My best friend. The Bonnie to my Clyde. The yin to my yang. I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life but dang I got this one right,” he shared on Instagram. “Through all the injuries, jokes, memes, hashtags, doubts, mistakes, she held me down and stood up for me just like my family did and that’s how I knew. When the world turns their back on you, look around…those that are still there are the ones that will ALWAYS be there.”
According to Te’o’s Instagram account, the couple had a sealing ceremony in the Mount Timpanogos Utah Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in November 2021.
The couple have a daughter who recently turned 1.