Shay Carl Enters Rehab After Public Cheating Scandal, Admission Of Alcohol Abuse
Shay Carl is now headed to rehab, with the popular YouTube vlogger reportedly seeking help for alcohol abuse after his very public cheating scandal brought an abrupt end to his social media presence.
Earlier this month, an Instagram model and self-professed “cam girl” named Aria Nina shared some very graphic exchanges with Shay Carl Butler, the married father of five who led the wildly popular Shaytards channel. The revelation was a shock to fans of the devoutly Mormon family, who were seen as one of the more wholesome YouTube offerings.
At the same time, Shay Carl shared a long message with fans admitting that he had fallen back into alcohol abuse. Though Shay did not mention the cheating scandal specifically, he did reference letting his family down.
“I have struggled with alcoholism for years,” Carl wrote on Twitter (via the Idaho State Journal). “I thought I was able to escape addiction & it’s associated demons, but that disease has manifested itself back into my life (due to my decisions) because it is a life long disease.”
“My purpose is to rehab,” he added. “It’s my only priority. I will not be on the Internet. I’m sorry if you expected more out of me. I’m sorry I’ve let you down. I’m sorry I let my family down. I’m sorry I let myself down.”
Shay Carl is now seeking treatment for the alcohol addiction. As the Deseret News noted, the YouTube star headed off this week to begin rehab. The report did not specify what kind of facility he was going to or how long he would be there.
The Aria Nina scandal came just as the Shaytards family was ready to walk away from YouTube. Late last year, Shay Carl announced that the family would be taking an indefinite hiatus from filming vlogs, saying at the time that he wanted a chance for his five children to have some time away from the spotlight.
“I want to make it a personal goal to not post anything to YouTube for a year,” Shay Carl announced in a video last year. “I want to kind of internalize and re-calibrate and just process this crazy journey that all of this YouTube adventure has been for us.”
“I love my kids, but they see me at my best when the camera is on,” he added.
Instead, Shay Carl’s cheating scandal brought a new focus on his family, and they seem to have responded by going silent. After his announcement to fans that he was seeking help for alcohol addition, Shay Carl has not made any public appearances or statements.
His wife, Colette Butler, has also gone quiet on social media. Her last post on Twitter came on February 10, just before the scandal broke, and she has not posted anything to Instagram in several weeks as well.
Who is Colette Butler, Shaytards YouTuber Shay Carl's wife? https://t.co/C5jpxrUJlk pic.twitter.com/JDnzAu4CWe
— Intl. Business Times (@IBTimes) February 16, 2017
The silence for Shay Carl and Colette Butler has led to rumors that the couple could be headed for divorce, but so far there are no indication from either whether those reports might be true.
It is not clear if Shay Carl has any plans to return to YouTube once his rehab is over. As one of the founders of the YouTube content creation company Makers Studio, Shay Carl hit it big in 2014 when Disney purchased the studio for a reported $500 million. Since then, the Butler family has built a home in rural Idaho and late last year he purchased a local ski resort.
[Featured Image by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images]
