This year, we saw a strange alliance as Paul Staehle and Karine Martins hoped to regain custody of their sons.
Paul has been working in Brazil, where his status as an American with experience living there has been an asset.
Unfortunately, tragedy has struck. According to Karine — and, separately, to alleged texts that he sent to his mom — Paul went missing this week.
Bizarrely, Karine seems to already be eulogizing him on social media. Hopefully, that is premature.
We want to emphasize that, as of Friday morning on September 1, the world has not heard from Paul. Not directly or indirectly.
Obviously, we all hope to have good news in the near future.
In the mean time, we mostly just have Karine’s posts. And, according to her, he went missing on Wednesday night.
“Paul went missing last night in Brazil,” Karine wrote on her Instagram Story.
“Prayers he is found safe,” she wrote.
We can confirm that she is not the only person reporting that Paul vanished. He also messaged his mother, saying that he had messed up in some way. It sounds like he may have simply gotten lost in the wilderness, but we cannot be certain.
Late into the night on Thursday (technically Friday morning), Karine posted a montage of Paul’s photos set to a sad song.
The in memoriam slideshow included a caption: “Not all of our memories were bad. Our children loved you very much.”
Karine continued: “We will never forget you or the good memories we all shared.” Every part of that seems to strongly imply that Karine, at least, does not expect to see Paul alive again.
Karine also decided to share an Instagram STory post about life insurance.
The post reads that “life insurance is a final way of telling your loved ones, ‘I’ve got you.'”
Is the implication here that Paul died, that she is his life insurance beneficiary, and that she expects a payout? We imagine that an insurance company might wait to find out if he’s alive or dead, first.
Most bizarrely of all, this is also when Karine decided to share a glimpse at her body.
Some have perceived Karine’s post as a baby bump reveal. Whether the baby is Paul’s or not — Paul has been in Brazil for some time — is difficult to say.
Without confirmation — that Karine is pregnant, that Paul is no longer alive — it is difficult to say what exactly is going on.
This is, by the way, a very weird week to be Karine’s ex.
Last year, she dated notorious fame-seeker Josh Seiter for a period of weeks. Earlier this week, just a couple of days before Paul seemingly vanished, Josh’s Instagram page announced his death.
It turned out that Josh’s death announcement was a cruel hoax. He’s alive! We would welcome similar news about Paul’s fate, though that seems less likely.
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