What Manti Te'o's vulnerability in 'Untold' documentary shows us about self-forgiveness | Opinion

We thought we knew who Manti Te’o was, didn’t we?

The Notre Dame star gullible enough to get catfished.

The Heisman Trophy runner-up who fell flat in the 2013 national championship game.

The second-round NFL draft pick who failed to live up to expectations.

But now we know him a lot better, don’t we?

"Untold: The Girlfriend Who Didn't Exist," a documentary about the catfishing hoax that engulfed Te’o when he was a linebacker at Notre Dame, reveals to the public a new side of this maligned man.

Further reading: How Manti Te'o got through 'darkest moments' of girlfriend hoax

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He has suffered immensely, evidenced by the tears he shed and vulnerability he showed during interviews for the film.

But he has forgiven his perpetrator.

“And I want everybody to know ... that I forgive him.’’

Now Te’o is working on forgiving himself — for the hoax that led to ridicule, shame and criticism even from his own father.

“I’m going to rise above all of that, bro,’’ he said.

In the documentary, he comes across as honest, caring, earnest. There's no doubting his sincerity in saying until he'd been duped, he'd never even heard of the term catfished, defined by Oxford Languages as "luring (someone) into a relationship by means of a fictional online persona.''

This does not end questions of how over a three-year period Te’o failed to realize that a woman he’d never met, yet called his girlfriend, did not exist.

Or why at a Heisman Trophy news conference he volunteered a story about his deceased girlfriend – even though she’d miraculously resurfaced two days earlier.

But the documentary makes those issues so much less important during a scandal that began to unfold publicly at the start of Te’o’s senior season.

A quick refresher:

Days before the season opener, Te’o told reporters, his girlfriend and grandmother died on the same day.

The heartbreaking story spread across the country after Te’o, a linebacker, dedicated his season to both women and proceeded to have an astounding year.

He helped lead Notre Dame to a 12-0 regular-season record and to the national title game against Alabama, with only one hitch.

His girlfriend was fictitious.

She was the creation of Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, a transgender woman who was struggling with her gender identity at the time and wanted to experiment with what life would be like as a woman. (The documentary notes that Te’o and others interviewed did not know at the time that Tuiasosopo is transgender.)

Deadspin, a sports website, broke the story two days after Notre Dame lost to Alabama in the national championship game – at a time when Te’o wasn’t sure if his nonexistent girlfriend was dead or alive or real.

What feels real: Te’o.

You might have been shaking your head to learn that the girlfriend Te’o knew as Lennay Kekua supposedly was in a car crash and, while on a respirator, was diagnosed with leukemia.

But there's no doubting the authenticity of Te'o.

He beams at the memory of being told that Lennay has responded more to the sound of his voice than any other, as his girlfriend supposedly fought for her life.

With wonderment, Te’o recalls how he was dedicated to talking to his girlfriend every night if it meant it would help.

Interviews with Tuiasosopo offer more insight into the manipulation behind the elaborate plot that fed Te’o’s hope that Lennay was real – the 22-year-old Stanford student he told people she was.

When the scandal broke, Te’o answered some questions, including from Katie Couric during an exclusive interview on her talk show that then aired on ABC.

“One of the theories, many theories, making the rounds is somehow you created this whole scenario to cover up your sexual orientation,’’ Couric said. “Are you gay?’’

Te’o smiled.

“No,’’ he replied. “Far from it. Far from it.’’

Today he is married, and his wife is pregnant with their second child. He played eight mostly unremarkable seasons in the NFL.

Nothing protected him from the aftershocks of the scandal. Even when he tried to run from it.

Not too long after the Couric interview, he began sidestepping questions. Saying he wanted to move on. And looking guarded, as if, perhaps, still hiding something.

Now we know.

Because Te’o agreed to be interviewed for the documentary. Because he appeared to answer every question thrown at him. And provided insight into how he’s coped with the trauma.

Struck by anxiety and self-doubt after reaching the NFL, and still overwhelmed during his third year in the league, Te'o recalls, he sought help from a therapist. He remembers the first meeting.

“At the end, he says, ‘Let me ask you a question. Have you forgiven him? “ Te’o said. “I said what are you talking about?’

“’Have you forgiven Ronaiah for what he did to you?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, I did.’

"He said, ‘OK, let me ask you a second question.'"

The second question: Have you forgiven yourself?

“And I looked at him and I was like, ‘What do you mean forgive myself?’” Te’o said. “He’s like, have you forgiven yourself?' I said, ‘Forgiven myself for what?'"

The therapist explained that Te’o had thrived because of his self-confidence that had been eroded. That “deep down inside, you’re questioning yourself.

“You have to forgive that kid," Te’o recalled the therapist telling him. “It’s OK. What happened to you is not your fault."

The film ends with Te'o talking not of himself, but of the perpetrator.

“I hope and pray that him and his family’s cool,’’ Te’o said. “Cause that’s all that I can wish for him.’’

What we can wish for Te'o is that he is remembered less as the college football star who got catfished, and more for the man who decided to face it all again, head on.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Manti Te'o Netflix doc reveals new side of ex-LB after catfishing hoax