Zach and Tori Roloff say they are bidding farewell to “Little People, Big World” and all the drama that came with it.
During a Feb. 22 episode of their podcast “Raising Heights,” the couple revealed that they and their children have not been part of the TLC series for the past six months. Roloff, 33, and Tori, 31, also opened up about how concern for their children’s right to privacy contributed to their decision to close the door on the series.
“We are not coming back to ‘Little People Big World,'” Tori explained at the start of the episode. “Like, we are done. That part of our lives, that chapter has closed.”
“The chapter is closed regardless of us being asked back or not,” added Roloff, who began appearing in the series when he was 16 years old. “We made it pretty clear. We’re done with that chapter for multiple reasons.”
Roloff clarified that because he and Tori — who joined the show in season 10 — were also not asked to return.
Zach Roloff and Tori Roloff with their three children Jackson Kyle, Lilah Ray and Josiah Luke.@toriroloff via Instagram
“This last cycle was rough,” he continued. “Between the family and the farm deal, we were done with it.”
“It was no longer a project that we really believed in, and so the last year was hard. It was hard to show up every day for it,” Tori added.
The couple, who married in 2015, explained that their children’s increasing requests to keep aspects of their lives private played a large part in their decision to walk away.
“It has gotten to this point where our oldest, Jackson, has voiced his opinion on things that he doesn’t want to be a part of with the filming of the show,” Tori explained. “There have been certain things that he has asked not to share, and I think that as a parent, we’ve really taken that to heart of having to stand back and look at the whole picture. I think that was a huge reason for us stepping away.”
Roloff and Tori have three children together, including a 6-year-old son named Jackson Kyle, Lilah Ray, 4, and Josiah Luke, who is 21 months.
In addition to privacy concerns, the couple admitted that they felt the show had begun to veer off course from the original aim of the series, which they said set out to introduce viewers to the lives of people with dwarfism without being exploitative.
“I look at your family and I think (the show) has changed how the world looks at people with dwarfism,” Tori explained. ” I think something I didn’t love towards the end of filming was I do believe that it got away from that. It got away from this idea that I’m going to show what the daily life of a person with dwarfism looks like.”
Roloff added that the production’s focus on family disagreements caused the series to more than deviate from its original goal.
“It was finally like this is nonsense,” Roloff added. “This is out of control.”
Fans of the series will recall how the show’s cast — which initially featured Roloff, his parents and siblings— experienced ups and downs in recent seasons. In 2016, Roloff’s parents, Matt Roloff and Amy Roloff, divorced after 27 years of marriage. According to People.com, Amy also accused her ex-husband of having an extramarital affair with an employee on their family farm.
(L-R, top to bottom) Molly Roloff, Jeremy Roloff, Zach Roloff, Amy Roloff Matthew Roloff and Jacob Roloff. TLC
For Roloff and Tori, time away from the series has already been a salve in terms of their family relationships.
“Already those relationships have started to like, come back, they’ll never be the same,” Tori said. “I’ll never be what it was, unfortunately, but I do feel like it was also time for us to move on because I didn’t want personally to hate your family.”
