Companies who sponsored YouTube star Myka Stauffer are speaking out amid her family's adoption controversy.
Playtex Baby, Danimals and other brands have announced they've severed ties with the parenting and lifestyle influencer after learning she and her husband, James Stauffer, gave up custody of their adopted son Huxley, who has special needs.
Myka, whose popular YouTube channel boasts more than 700,000 subscribers, began facing a backlash this week after she and James revealed in an emotional YouTube video that they gave up 4-year-old Huxley so he could be adopted by another family. Many fans accused the couple of being bad parents, and also of monetizing Huxley by selling advertising on online content about him.
After critics began flooding the social media accounts of companies who partnered with Myka to express their outrage, the companies responded to say they were no longer working with the YouTube star.
Danimals wrote on Instagram, "We have previously worked with Myka Stauffer and are no longer working with her. We are aware of the news she shared about her family, and are very sad to hear about this difficult situation."
Playtex Baby, Suave, Chili's, Big Lots and more had similar responses when customers asked if they would continue partnering with Myka.
"Our last post with her was back in February. We are not partnering with her moving forward," Playtex Baby told one critic on Instagram.
"We are no longer working with this individual," Suave said in multiple comment replies on an Instagram post.
"We haven’t partnered with Myka since the fall of 2019 and do not have plans for any future partnerships," Chili's told one commenter who posted on Instagram using the hashtag #justiceforhuxley.
"We had a one-time partnership with Myka in the summer of 2019," Big Lots said in a comment. "We currently do not have any sponsorships with Myka and will not work with her in the future."
"We are not currently working with the Stauffer family and do not have plans to partner with them in the future," the Barbie brand told angry customers on Instagram.
Fabletics commented on Instagram, "We can confirm that Fabletics is no longer working with Myka."
The Stauffers, who also have a joint YouTube channel, The Stauffer Life, with more than 300,000 followers, adopted Huxley from China in 2017. They also share four other children: Nakova, Jaka, Radley and Onyx, who was born in 2019.
In an article for Parade in September 2019, Myka revealed that she and James were told by the adoption agency that Huxley had a brain tumor and “brain damage," but upon his arrival in the United States, they learned Huxley had suffered a stroke in utero, and had autism and a sensory processing disorder.
Myka produced 27 videos about the couple's “adoption journey” with Huxley over the years, sharing updates about everything from their fundraising efforts and frustrations with the ever-changing rules surrounding international adoption, to their learning about their potential child's special needs.
Earlier this year, fans who follow the family online began noticing that Huxley had been missing from photos and other posts on the family's social media and YouTube accounts.
On Tuesday, the couple shared their YouTube video, titled "an update on our family," revealing that they'd given up custody of Huxley.
"Once Huxley came home, there was a lot more special needs that we weren't aware of, and that we were not told," James said in the video.
"There's not an ounce of our body that doesn't love Huxley with all of our being," Myka added. "There wasn't a minute that I didn't try our hardest and I think what Jim is trying to say is that after multiple assessments, after multiple evaluations, numerous medical professionals have felt that he needed a different fit and that (with) his medical needs, he needed more."