It's been a long time since we've laid eyes on Ryan Edwards.

And that's by design, of course.

Like Rob Kardasian before him, Ryan made millions as a reality TV star, but when he's not getting paid, he prefers to remain off camera.

And some fans think Edwards' reason for lying low is that he's hiding a dangerous secret.

Ryan made a rare appearance on social media this week when wife Mackenzie Standifer shared a photo of Edwards spending time with his youngest daughter.

“Pretty rare that we get 1 on 1 time with each of our kids... but when we do it’s perfect," she captioned the photo.

Clearly, Mack's intention was to share a sweet family moment.

But the post quickly became such a hotbed of harsh criticism that she was forced to turn off comments.

Most of the offending remarks come from followers who are concerned about Ryan's appearance.

Either that, or they're pretending to be concerned about his appearance so that they can make fun of him without feeing guilty.

“Rough,” one fan wrote before Mack turned off comments.

“No hate at all but Ryan looks like hell...” another follower chimed in, according to The Sun.

Now, anyone with eyes can see that Ryan looks pretty much how he's always looked.

But for some fans, maybe that's the problem.

For most of his time in the spotlight, Ryan has been struggling with addiction.

At times, his struggles with substance abuse brought Edwards to some very dark places.

Edwards was in prison when Ryan welcomed Stella into the world, a fact that makes the latest pic of father and daughter all the more poignant.

“It’s heroin and I have a problem," the former Teen Mom OG star told police at the time of his arrest.

His candor and his willingness to get clean might have saved Ryan from spending three years behind bars, which was the expected sentence based on the amount of heroin in his vehicle when he got pulled over.

It's been tough to keep tabs on Ryan in the year since he and his family were fired from Teen Mom OG, but based on this latest pic, we'd say that he seems to be doing alright.

Perhaps the problem is that the title of the show sets up the expectation that its stars will all look like teens.

But the reality is that Ryan is a 33-year-old father of three, so it's not surprising that he might be a little heavier than when he started on the show, or that his hair might have started greying a little.

These days, our only updates about Ryan come from Mack's social media page, so obviously, the truth of the situation is being filtered through her bias.

But it's important to remember that Standifer was Edwards' harshest critic in his using days, so it seems unlikely that she would help him hide the fact that he's off the wagon.

Then again, both of them are of the opinion that Ryan can drink alcohol and still consider himself "sober," so it's really anyone's guess what's going on in that wacky household!