Emilie Kiser has returned to social media with a 13-minute video apologising after her toddler son Teddy was seen without a life jacket while on a boat. The influencer, 27, first addressed the incident – which came just over a year after her son Trigg drowned at their family home when he was three – via a short statement. Now she has returned to TikTok for the first time in weeks with a lengthy video explaining exactly what happened and apologising once more to her 5.1 million followers.
In footage taken from her trip to Mallorca in June with her husband Brady and fellow influencer Madi Curtis, Emilie’s son Teddy, who is 16 months old, is seen sitting with his father on the boat without a life jacket on. The video has since been deleted, but sparked fierce backlash from fans towards Emilie, who has become an advocate for water safety since her son’s death last year.
Backlash and Initial Response
One fan, @aquasea1117 wrote: ‘I literally cannot believe they brought that baby on a boat never mind not safely.’ While kimaodonnell added: ‘Seriously how could they possibly still be so negligent?’
After over two weeks away from social media, the lifestyle creator returned on Friday to address the entire situation in full, starting by admitting she ‘knows [she’s] made mistakes’ and that she’s ‘an imperfect human’ and that sometimes she says or does things that ‘can be confusing’.
Emilie's Explanation and Apology
‘Over the course of the last year our family has been no stranger to tragedy and how quickly life can change and that’s really I can say,’ she began. Reiterating that she and her husband would ‘forever and always’ take accountability for the situation that led to their son’s death in a ‘preventable drowning’ incident. Turning to the recent debacle involving her other son Teddy being on the boat without a life jacket, she acknowledged people’s anger and argued that her children’s safety would never be compromised for ‘aesthetic’ before explaining what happened on the boat.
‘It was simply a mistake and I’m so sorry,’ she said, before adding: ‘He was fussy and we decided to take a few moments to calm him down and we see now that that was a mistake and that was no reason ever why a child should be out of a life jacket.’
‘Even though in the moment it seemed like the right thing to do for our child, I understand that at any moment something could have happened and could have gone wrong,’ she reflected.
Water Safety Advocacy and Personal Reflections
She shared that conversations about water safety awareness and advocacy are ‘so important’. ‘But I know by putting my life on the internet and choosing to come back to the internet after my son passed away, that I was going to be open to these conversations and I will forever be open to these conversations because I am choosing to share my life.
‘I understand that and I am honestly okay with that because I think our story is powerful, Trigg’s story is powerful and I do not want other families to have to go through the tragic loss that we have had to go through,’ she continued. Promising she would ‘always try to be better and do better’, she added that she’s been ‘scared’ for a long time of people twisting her words and making her feel like she ‘can’t say anything right’ or ‘do anything right’.
‘I hope you guys understand that I am never coming from a place of bad intentions. I am always coming from a place of good and just doing my best and trying to navigate what feels impossible,’ she said.
Elsewhere in the video she hit back at speculation that her son Teddy wasn’t in ISR (infant swimming resource) lessons by confirming he has been. She also confirmed they have ‘had a pool fence for well over a year now’ and has realised they are a ‘non-negotiable’. In an emotional moment she also told her followers that they ‘have not, do not and will not’ swim in the pool where their son, Trigg, drowned.
She concluded her video by sharing that she will discuss ‘water safety and advocacy’ when it feels appropriate to her. ‘I’m exhausted and it is impossible to prove to people who want to see nothing but the worst in you that you have good intentions or that you are telling the truth or that those things are not true,’ she said about addressing any other rumours.
Previous Statement and Ongoing Impact
This long video response comes a few weeks after Emilie addressed the reaction with a statement shared to her Instagram Stories saying: ‘Our child should have been in his life jacket for the entirety of that boat ride, not even for the few moments that he was out of it.
‘We are painfully aware that in a matter of seconds, your entire life can change, and we should have done better.’ She added: ‘We recognise and appreciate the genuine care that people have for our children. There has also been a deep level of anger and hurt directed toward our family, and we understand the basis of those feelings as well. It comes from the belief that Trigg should still be here, and we share that same belief more than can be expressed. He was only three years old, and should have lived a lifetime more.
‘That reality lives with us every moment of every single day.’ The post concluded: ‘We will continue to do better, advocate for better and, as hard as we try to avoid them, still make mistakes. ‘We can only promise that we will never stop learning from them and continue loving our children with everything we have.’
Earlier this month Emilie announced that she and Brady are expecting their third baby, one year after Trigg’s death. She described the pregnancy as a ‘bright light’ after one of the darkest years of her family’s life. Trigg drowned in an accident at the family’s Arizona home after falling into the swimming pool on May 12, 2025. He died in hospital six days later.
In the following months, the couple faced intense public scrutiny. Police recommended Brady face a felony child abuse charge after investigating the circumstances surrounding Trigg’s drowning, but prosecutors later announced they would not pursue criminal charges. Police records alleged Brady lost sight of Trigg while caring for Teddy, who was a newborn at the time, with investigators claiming surveillance footage showed the three-year-old had been unsupervised for longer than initially described.
Emilie later won a court battle to prevent the most graphic details of the investigation from becoming public. A judge ruled that portions of the police report, including descriptions of responding officers’ body camera footage, were so emotionally distressing that keeping them private was justified.
Despite the unimaginable loss, Emilie has gradually begun speaking about her grief. She spoke on Jay Shetty’s On Purpose podcast in her first interview, where she reflected on how losing a child has changed her life. ‘Losing a child really shows you in the scariest, most real way possible just how quickly life can change,’ she said.
