Maci Bookout has been a familiar face on MTV for nearly a decade. The 25-year-old reality star first appeared on MTV as a pregnant teen on 16 and Pregnant. Since then she’s been starring on the Teen Mom spin off series, now known as Teen Mom OG. Through the seasons we’ve seen Maci’s life take many twists and turns, especially when it comes to her relationships. While on the show we’ve seen her go from being engaged to Bentley’s father, Ryan, to dating Kyle King and now she’s on the brink of marrying her long-term boyfriend, Taylor McKinney! Taylor has been appearing alongside Maci on Teen Mom for past couple years and since then we’ve seen them welcome two children, 16-month old Jayde and 4-month old Mavrick, into their growing family. As they gear up to walk down the aisle together, we’ve compiled a list of 10 things you probably didn’t know about Maci and Taylor’s relationship!
10. How They Met
Not long after her relationship with Kyle ended, Maci traveled down to Texas with her best friend Raj to visit another friend named Cassandra. When they got there Maci and Raj met Cassandra’s best friend, Taylor. In her memoir, Bulletproof, Maci informs readers that she had actually met Taylor before when the same four of them were in New Orleans for a Supercross race, but it wasn’t until the second time around that Maci really got to know Taylor a lot better. “The first thing that stood out to me about him was that he had no idea who I was. After he’d been around me for a second and saw people taking pictures of me, he figured out I was on TV. But he never so much as brought it up. He just treated me like I was Maci, some girl he’d met with his friends. It was a breath of fresh air to be around someone new, who didn’t give a sh-t about the TV show I was on,” she wrote. She was also super impressed at how he managed to find friends every place they went that weekend and was immediately drawn to his charisma. At some point over the weekend Maci managed to get Taylor’s number and so when she got home, she started texting him. Once he texted back, the conversation never stopped!
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9. Taking It Slow
Maci leads readers through the various stages of her relationship with Taylor. Maci and Taylor had been texting for about two months when he and her friend Cassandra made plans to visit her in Chattanooga. They had another great weekend together, and the night before they left, Maci and her roommates hosted a Halloween party. When the party ended, she was laying down on a bed with Taylor and she mentions how he never tried to kiss her or “creep close” even though they’d been drinking all night, were alone and had clearly begun a flirtatious relationship. She planned another trip to visit him in November and at this point it was clear they were interested in one another. She spent every night in his room that weekend, but once again nothing happened, not even a kiss. She started to get worried about things not moving forward so she confronted him about why he hadn’t tried to kiss her and he responded with, “I just respect you and what you wanna do, so I’m not gonna push you to do anything.” Afterwards, they decided to take things slow. Maci and Taylor had a long distance relationship for over a year before they finally reached an ultimatum — they had to either break up or move closer to one another, so Taylor decided to uproot his life and move all the way to Chattanooga.
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8. Becoming a Father Figure
Before Taylor moved in with Maci and Bentley, they spent a lot of time talking about how he would make the transition from Bentley’s friend to a parental figure. They knew it would be an adjustment for them all, especially Bentley. Taylor was going from being a single guy with no responsibilities to moving away from all his friends and family to raise a 5-year-old and live with a significant other. Luckily, Taylor took to his new life well and him and Bentley were great together. She does describe a few times when Taylor had to deal with Bentley resisting his authority and pulling the “you’re not my dad” card. Surprisingly, Taylor knew just how to handle it and he decided to have a serious conversation with Bentley. He told him, “I’m not your dad, and I’m not trying to replace your dad. But when you say things like that, it hurts my feelings. I am here for you, and even though you might not like what I’m saying, you still have to respect me as an adult and as someone who takes care of you.” He also told Bentley he could always talk to him about it. “You won’t be wrong if you can talk about it without being disrespectful.” Maci said they never had any problems again after that, and Taylor even went on to coach Bentley’s Little League team!
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7. Getting Serious
It’s a given that Maci and Taylor knew they were serious about one another prior to him moving in, but things escalated when Maci found out she had polycystic ovary syndrome which led to her having to get Depo Provera birth control injections to treat her ovarian cysts. After a bit of research, she realized PCOS is one of the leading causes of infertility. Her and Taylor were forced to discuss whether or not they wanted children and if they were okay with potentially adopting in the future. Being the guy that he is, Taylor assured Maci it wasn’t a deal breaker for him if she couldn’t have children. Not long after, she saw a fertility specialist to see if she should be trying to have another child sooner rather than later now that she knew her and Taylor wanted to have their own children together. The doctor told her she wasn’t producing eggs so her and Taylor decided she might as well go off birth control. “We knew we wanted to get married. We knew we were in it for the long haul. And we knew as well as anyone that conceiving usually gets harder with age, not easier…It wasn’t like Taylor and I were desperate for a baby right at that moment. And if the outlook didn’t improve and we got to feeling like we couldn’t wait, we’d already decided we would be one hundred percent happy adopting a child,” she wrote.
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6. Jayde Carter McKinney
Maci hadn’t been off birth control that long before she found herself pregnant with her second child, a daughter. She describes the night she found out she was pregnant in her memoir. “One night we were hanging out, watching the Cowboys and drinking beer when I started to have these weird symptoms. My legs were getting tingly and itchy for no apparent reason, and my breasts felt tender. The tenderness in particular caught my attention. I mentioned it to Taylor and said, ‘Maybe I should take a pregnancy test, just in case.'” After the game, they went out and bought a test and sure enough it was positive! They were both shocked, but completely over the moon about it considering she was previously told her body was a “No Pregnancy Zone.” They bought a bigger home, moved in a few months before their due date. In June 2015 they welcomed their baby girl, Jayde Carter McKinney.
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5. Their Engagement
After just about three years together, Maci and Taylor finally got engaged! Taylor popped the question last January while they were in Los Angeles filming the reunion for Teen Mom. He collaborated with producers behind Maci’s back to get her down to Venice beach and have photographers there to catch the moment. Producers told Maci she had to go to the beach to do an interview with MTV.com which was merely a trick just to get her down to the beach so Taylor could get down on one knee and ask her to marry him! Her response was, “Finally!” and of course, she said ‘Yes.’ A few days later she took to Instagram to share the happy news with a photo of her kissing Taylor, showing off the new ring and a caption that read: “Well y’all, my best friend asked me to marry him! I’m one lucky lady, I love you T!” The proposal was shown on the 6th season of Teen Mom OG. When asked about how the proposal went down, McKinney said it was actually a very last minute decision! “The proposal just came together last minute. But I had been working on the ring with Tara at Ring Finger Studios for a couple months. I told myself I didn’t care what anybody else had to say, I was gonna do it when I felt the time was right. And when it hit me I just went with it,” he said. He also pointed out that it was important for him to get permission from Bentley before he asked Maci.
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4. The Naysayers
When Taylor finally popped the question after many months and even a year of nagging from Maci, a lot of fans suspected that he only popped the question to stop her from questioning him all the time. During a Q&A on the official Teen Mom Facebook page, McKinney finally spoke out about his delayed proposal and put a stop to all the naysayers. First someone asked why he waited so long and why he thought it was “OK to have a baby with someone and not marry them.” To that he responded, “Well that wasn’t planned but why should I rush a proposal just because we had a baby. I wanted it to still be special to her. It might not be considered the ‘right way’ but it’s the way we ended up and we’re all good. Loving every minute of it,” he said. Another follower wrote, “Why did you let Maci pressure you into proposing? I felt it was childish for her to say you guys should just end things if you weren’t going to do it.” McKinney responded once again, but this time in defense of his fiancee. “You get to see a small portion of it. Don’t get it twisted. And that comment was about that conversation at the moment, not ending our relationship.”
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3. Surprise Pregnancy
Maci and Taylor’s latest pregnancy was not only a huge shock to fans, but it was a huge shock to them as well! Maci admits she didn’t realize she was pregnant until she was 21 weeks. The reality couple learned they were expecting their second child together (and Maci’s third) only two days after Taylor got down on one knee. They got engaged in January and Maci’s due date was in May! The way she found out was quite ironic. Maci went to the doctor to ask about having her birth control prescription refilled so she could avoid another pregnancy, to which her doctor responded that she couldn’t because she was already pregnant! “Everyone is shocked. I mean, even we were completely speechless, and every time I shared the news with someone, I said, ‘OK, are you sitting down?’ And then I said, ‘Feel free to say ‘holy sh***’ or congratulations because both are fine.’ Because that’s pretty much how I’ve been the whole time!,” she said during an interview with Us Weekly. It seems odd that Maci wouldn’t realize she was pregnant until she was already 3 months along, but she claims she thought it was simply excess baby weight. She had only just recently given birth to their daughter Jayde, so it wasn’t unusual that her period wouldn’t return right away and early pregnancy symptoms like extreme tiredness are also common in the postnatal period. But we’re pretty sure Maci should be well versed on the fact that women are most fertile in the following months after giving birth — just sayin’!
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2. Controversy
Because Maci’s pregnancy was such a surprise, she wasn’t exactly doing due diligence to take care of her body during the early stages. The happy news hasn’t exactly been well received by everyone. She caught a lot of flack from fans who scoured her Instagram and noticed she was drinking beer at a football game only six weeks before she announced she was three months pregnant. Not only that, but she found out she was pregnant soon after she got engaged, which was right after they wrapped up filming the Teen Mom OG reunion show. Fans blasted her because there was a lot of footage from the past season that showed Maci and Taylor McKinney out drinking with friends while on vacation. Unfortunately, the timing of her pregnancy means all of that happened during the early stages of her pregnancy. Maci has stood firm against any claims against her that she didn’t know she was pregnant and therefore wasn’t doing any intentional harm to her child. Regardless of how it all happened, Maci and Taylor welcomed their son, Maverick, in May and everyone is happy and healthy!
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1. The Wedding
Maci’s life never seems to slow down and it didn’t help that she was pregnant and then raising two children under the age of two while planning her wedding! In the most recent season of Teen Mom OG viewers are able to see the early stages of Maci’s wedding planning while her and Taylor shop around for wedding venues. Originally the two announced they would be doing a destination wedding, but after shopping around online Maci found a beautiful venue in Florida not far from their home state where they could host both the ceremony and reception all in one place. After a quick visit to the venue, the couple decided and it was general knowledge that the wedding would be held in October of this year. Just to add to all the already existing chaos in their lives, the exact date of their wedding has unfortunately been revealed. It seems there was a battle between their photographer and another customer who she was also booked to shoot on that same date. The photographer ended up choosing Maci and Taylor’s wedding so she could get national exposure which lead to the world knowing the coveted date was October 8th. It’s already a busy month for stars of Teen Mom as Chelsea Houska will also be getting married later that month and Amber Portwood. Houska has made it clear she will not allow MTV cameras to film the special day, but Maci and Taylor have agreed to film so fans can look forward to watching all the details of their special day in the near future!
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