Does anybody know if Nick has a definitive tell when he's lying?
Apart from general discomfort (getting upset/emotional/tense) Nick's main tell is omitting/ignoring information and being vague/avoidant. A superchatter once asked Nick how April was doing and Nick said "I don't know, I can tell you how I
think she's doing" and then didn't even do that.
Just something to keep in mind; Nick is mostly trying to play to the room for his own benefit whether he is lying or telling the truth about something. Nick doesn't have a serious concept of truth and tends to just go with whatever sounds good to him at the time. It's why he flip-flops on things like marriage advice ("People change over the course of a marriage so you shouldn't hold to the values you had when you were first married" vs "I made a vow. It wouldn't be honoring to our marriage if I didn't live up to the principles we committed to when we got married").
Nick takes immense pleasure in pulling things out of his rear (at
least as much as putting things in), and Nick will say things that he doesn't know to be true
or false because, well, he just isn't smart enough and often treads out of his depth.
I think it's either that Kayla was semi-normal when she was in like, say, high school, and she and Nick descended together over the years, or she's the BPD Harley to his Joker LARP all along. Her weird behavior on stream specifically of saying she's a bad wife and mother etc. does sound like the type of undermining narcs do to 'loved ones'.
I do think anyone who's had experience with a narcissist should know how they chip away at trust over time and impose their beliefs on anyone close to them. It doesn't mean Kayla was in any way a saint but I just can't picture a narcissist being a victim to a woman like her. He probably did undermine her in certain ways that a smarter person would have gotten away from... I have multiple people in my family who called it quits with narcs long before there was even a widely used term for such people. So it happens. Kayla is definitely responsible for her involvement even in the most generous interpretation where she didn't initiate the downward spiral.
It's typical for narcs to not care about their children at all beyond ego fuel, then dispense of them when the responsibility outweighs the benefit. But I wonder what went on in Kayla's fucked-up-ass head to sell out her kids too. Wonder if she never wanted to have that many. Or a BPD situation like I proposed earlier.
The way Nick talks about who Kayla
was indicates that Kayla changed more over time than he did. How he wouldn't even want to talk to the Kayla from back then these days. There was also Kayla's admission to pestering Nick about the lack of being "different" in a Christian context (meaning Nick wasn't really exemplifying Christ in his life). Kayla initially didn't like Nick's YouTube career or his content and was happy each time Nick got kicked off of Twitter because of how mean he was to others online and the general content.
Nick, of course, ended up validating all of Kayla's fears. Kayla's response was to go along with it. Here are Nick and Kayla during the oft-referenced 18 year anniversary in 2022 talking about how they had changed over time regarding profanity.
Kayla: I used to be a good girl 'till you broke me *smiles*
While it is unclear how much of a good girl Kayla
thought she was, it is clear that Kayla at one point knew Nick would make things worse and then just decided to go along with it (possibly because Nick had pulled in a lot of money at that point).
Nick being a hedonistic wastrel and Kayla being a mentally impaired enabler with her own serious problems make them complimentary in the worst way. They bring out the worst in each other.
While you all here on the Farms are AMAZING A-loggers, I have to give special mentions to those who have done major extensive A-logging/clipping that helped me find dates and clips much faster
Excellent post! Glad to see another working to catalogue Nick's descent.
As fun as it is to observe, document, and laugh at lolcows, it is important to recognize warning signs in others as well as oneself. Nick observed, documented, and laughed at Jack Murphy on his own channel and look at Nick now.
I don't know how helpful the Kayla OP will be since it is more focused on Kayla, but you are cordially invited to glean what you can. I tend to provide dates in my posts so that should make things easier.