Michael Oher made his first public appearance since alleging his adoptive parents, Sean and Leigh Anne Tuohy, lied about adopting him. On Monday, the former NFL offensive lineman attended a book signing in Baltimore for the book When Your Back’s Against the Wall: Fame, Football and Lessons Learned Through a Lifetime of Adversity. Oher signed copies of his book and took photos with fans. The 37-year-old also addressed the crowd, saying that he couldn’t talk about his current situation since it’s a legal issue.
“This book, it means a lot to me,” Oher said during brief remarks at the start of the event at The Ivy Bookshop, per the Associated Press. “Basically, it’s a playbook on life and how I continue to fight back and when your back’s against the wall. That’s how I’ve felt all my life.”
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Last week, Oher filed a petition in Tennessee, saying that the Tuohys never legally adopted him but tricked him into making them his conservators. The petition also says that the four members of the Tuohy family were paid $225,000 for The Blind Side, plus 2.5 percent of the film’s proceeds, but “Michael received nothing.”
“Mike didn’t grow up with a stable family life. When the Tuohy family told Mike they loved him and wanted to adopt him, it filled a void that had been with him his entire life,” his attorney J. Gerard Stranch IV told ESPN. “Discovering that he wasn’t actually adopted devastated Mike and wounded him deeply.”
Sean Tuohy responded to the petition and said the conservatorship was “the only thing” he and Leigh Anne could do to make him part of the family since he was 18 years old and wanted to play football at Ole Miss. “Michael was obviously living with us for a long time, and the NCAA didn’t like that,” Tuohy said. “They said the only way Michael could go to Ole Miss was if he was actually part of the family. I sat Michael down and told him, ‘If you’re planning to go to Ole Miss—or even considering Ole Miss—we think you have to be part of the family. This would do that, legally.’ We contacted lawyers who had told us that we couldn’t adopt over the age of 18. The only thing we could do was to have a conservatorship.”
Oher played eight seasons in the NFL and won a Super Bowl with the Baltimore Ravens in 2012. The Blind Side, released in 2009, is based on Oher’s life and was nominated for four Academy Awards. Sandra Bullock played Leigh Anne Tuohy won an Oscar for her role.
