Nathan (WAS) Courting Ashley (pt. 2)

[justmy2cents]

OK, found this preview on the Batesfam.blog and it's from May 18th so it looks like they broke up before Memorial Day.  So he visited her after?  

Wednesday, May 18, 2016

Updated Season 4 preview!

 

Twelve days ago, we shared the first four episode previews and we have an updated list thanks to a loyal reader! You can read that by clicking here! 

Big Family, Big Changes
June 2, 2016
Gil prepares for surgery; Whitney's and Zach share some exciting news; the kids have some fun playing in the snow.

Bates Boys Birthday Bash (formerly reported as: Speaking and Celebrating) 
June 9, 2016
Trace and Jeb celebrate their birthdays with a guys night; Erin and Chad head to South Carolina to speak at a banquet.

A Lovely day (formerly reported as: A ILYD to remember)
June 16, 2016
The family celebrates I Love You Day with the couples; Tori's friend Bobby spends time with the Bates clan.

Sunshine State Bates (formerly reported as:  Florida DIL) 
June 23, 2016
Alyssa and John get a visit in Florida and share their plans about expanding their family; Jackson, Warden and Isaiah work on a fort.

Tough Decisions and Large Ambitions
June 30, 2016
Lawson travels to Nashville to make exciting new plans for his music career; Nathan shares some unexpected news.

[marmalade]

1 minute ago, Coconut Flan said:

That is one of the oddest things Kelly has done if she was the one actually making the post. 

It was on the Batesfam Insta, and she's the one who usually posts there. 

I also speculated above that they probably broke up too close to change the already-purchased plane tickets to NYC. I also noted that they were NOT touching in any of the pictures, and they were the most touchy-feely couple before that. 

[MorningMist]

3 minutes ago, Coconut Flan said:

That is one of the oddest things Kelly has done if she was the one actually making the post. 

It's evident from Lawson's 3 or 4 deleted Instagram posts about Kaci before the news broke that UP has a lot of control over how they portray themselves on social media (and probably the family account more so than the kids). I would assume that that post was mostly UPs doing which Kelly just went along with because UP supposedly know what they are doing.

6 minutes ago, marmalade said:

It was on the Batesfam Insta, and she's the one who usually posts there. 

I also speculated above that they probably broke up too close to change the already-purchased plane tickets to NYC. I also noted that they were NOT touching in any of the pictures, and they were the most touchy-feely couple before that. 

I don't feel like that was the only reason for him to go, I know we snark on fundies for having no life experience but I doubt even a Bates would spend the weekend with his ex and her family just to avoid wasting money. I would guess the tickets did have something to do with it, but it was more of a 'hey, we should talk about this and you already have tickets' kinda deal.

[OrchidBlossom]

36 minutes ago, Casserole said:

End of May, he was definitely with the Salyer's (and without a Bates chaperone) odd. 

 

 

Without a pictured Bates chaperone, at least. I mean if they're getting wise to how weird it seems that they're never allowed to go anywhere without a sibling maybe Lawson or Trace or someone just conveniently went missing for photo time? It'd be a little against precedent to send Nathan off solo... although mostly they've married off their female children so maybe the rules are laxer for him.

10 minutes ago, MorningMist said:

It's evident from Lawson's 3 or 4 deleted Instagram posts about Kaci before the news broke that UP has a lot of control over how they portray themselves on social media (and probably the family account more so than the kids). I would assume that that post was mostly UPs doing which Kelly just went along with because UP supposedly know what they are doing.

 

I missed these tweets. Are they discussed in any other forum? And if not could you recap them?

[justmy2cents]

21 minutes ago, MorningMist said:

II don't feel like that was the only reason for him to go, I know we snark on fundies for having no life experience but I doubt even a Bates would spend the weekend with his ex and her family just to avoid wasting money. I would guess the tickets did have something to do with it, but it was more of a 'hey, we should talk about this and you already have tickets' kinda deal.

That's plausible.  There was a fan who runs the 19kidsandloving tumbler who went to Carlin and Trace's graduation party at the end of April and she said that Ashley was there but she never saw her interact with Nathan.  They may have already broken up by then and she was there to keep up appearances but then he went there Memorial Day to talk.  Who knows?  It's all a little strange.

Speaking of the graduation party, I didn't see any previews for it.  Maybe they're running this season into August.

 

[MorningMist]

1 minute ago, OrchidBlossom said:

I missed these tweets. Are they discussed in any other forum? And if not could you recap them?

It was just the picture he posted of him and Kaci but he posted it the day before the news broke (coincidently the day JinJer was announced) and was very quickly deleted - I didn't say anything though as I could have been hallucinating or something.

I saw it the first time he posted it as I have Lawson (and a couple other fundies) instagram notifications on as he tends to delete a lot (I.e. that video of him and Jinger at that sports game last year) - I am however severely considering my life choices and potentially turning these notifications off. I then went to sleep, when I woke up I saw he had posted twice more only to find those posts had also been deleted so I just assume they were the same picture.

My guess is he tried to post a picture of his niece but UP told him off for it.

[OrchidBlossom]

1 minute ago, MorningMist said:

It was just the picture he posted of him and Kaci but he posted it the day before the news broke (coincidently the day JinJer was announced) and was very quickly deleted - I didn't say anything though as I could have been hallucinating or something.

I saw it the first time he posted it as I have Lawson (and a couple other fundies) instagram notifications on as he tends to delete a lot (I.e. that video of him and Jinger at that sports game last year) - I am however severely considering my life choices and potentially turning these notifications off. I then went to sleep, when I woke up I saw he had posted twice more only to find those posts had also been deleted so I just assume they were the same picture.

My guess is he tried to post a picture of his niece but UP told him off for it.

Makes sense, I've long thought UP has a tight lease on them to minimize the freakshow aspect.

[marmalade]

Well, from what we've figured out, they had broken up by Memorial Day, and the kid's birthday scene was totally non-plausible. Nathan says they talked "Sunday night" and broke up. The kid's birthday was 2/17. The kicker is that Valentine's Day itself was on a Sunday that year, and they were still together. UP screwed up with their staged scene timing, since it was implied that it was a phone conversation, not a break up in person. 

The breakup had to be fairly recent, or he never would have gone to NYC over Memorial Day weekend. 

[justmy2cents]

3 minutes ago, marmalade said:

 

The breakup had to be fairly recent, or he never would have gone to NYC over Memorial Day weekend. 

Except the episode was already in the can by mid May so they had to have broken up before then.

[Bazinga]

5 minutes ago, MorningMist said:

It was just the picture he posted of him and Kaci but he posted it the day before the news broke (coincidently the day JinJer was announced) and was very quickly deleted - I didn't say anything though as I could have been hallucinating or something.

I saw it the first time he posted it as I have Lawson (and a couple other fundies) instagram notifications on as he tends to delete a lot (I.e. that video of him and Jinger at that sports game last year) - I am however severely considering my life choices and potentially turning these notifications off. I then went to sleep, when I woke up I saw he had posted twice more only to find those posts had also been deleted so I just assume they were the same picture.

My guess is he tried to post a picture of his niece but UP told him off for it.

I know my opinion doesn't really matter, but what a sad way to live your life where you can't even post a photo of a natural family event. To not get to share the joy of a new niece over $$$ is pathetic. Or to post photos of your son and his now ex-girlfriend, when they clearly had already broken up just to boost ratings. The unfortunate thing is the adult children have to play along or else they probably (pure speculation) won't see any $$$ either. I really wish this family would have looked at the Duggars and seen how money truly changed them (In which I mean there was no sacred moment. Everything was always set in place for TV or a magazine cover). I guess if I had 19 mouths to feed I might sell my soul to the devil too, but I do feel bad for these kids. It's a warped sense of reality and I can only imagine that *some* of the children truly want to live a life of peace and away from everyone and UPs watchful eye.

[marmalade]

8 minutes ago, justmy2cents said:

Except the episode was already in the can by mid May so they had to have broken up before then.

That was my point. They were done, but fairly recently, or he wouldn't have gone to NYC at all. UP staged that scene in the bedroom. 

[sophie10130]

A poster in another thread made the astute observation that in the picture with Lawson and Kaci Lynn, on the board behind him is the phone number to the room. When the picture was put back up, that number was removed.

ETA: The post is on the 7th page of the Kaci Lynn thread

[MorningMist]

2 minutes ago, sophie10130 said:

A poster in another thread made the astute observation that in the picture with Lawson and Kaci Lynn, on the board behind him is the phone number to the room. When the picture was put back up, that number was blurred out (or erased?).

I didn't get a good look at the photo to confirm but seems plausible. Why wait another day though? Still a bit shady.

[picklepizzas]

UP has already posted a "break up or make up?" video, so maybe they really are planning a 'get back together' storyline. 

if they did really spontaneously break up, kelly and gil must have been SUPER surprised bc they waited quite a while to introduce ashley to the viewers in the first place. they must have felt very secure in the relationship to finally bring her on as nathan's love interest in the first place, given that they had been talking for months by the time she appeared on screen. 

[sophie10130]

1 minute ago, MorningMist said:

I didn't get a good look at the photo to confirm but seems plausible. Why wait another day though? Still a bit shady.

Oh yeah. I'm not saying there's not more at work here, just didn't want that person's observation to go unnoticed.

[doubleT]

Well, I am one that said up thread that there is no way the Bateses would let another child go through a public courtship break-up, but I was wrong. 

I noticed that while Nathan was sitting on Gil and Kelly's bed with his heart breaking, Kelly was waxing about how great it was that they could break up and remain friends and how that isn't the way it usually is.  So here is the score:

1 for "keeping our heart intact" courtship and

0 for "no purpose but to give away pieces of your heart" dating.      

 

Hope Nathan can learn from this and move on.  

[Purrl]

I thought they were really cute together but if it is true then maybe he can go to the Sonic and find him a regular girl to kiss and then turn fundy...

[Kaylo]

25 minutes ago, doubleT said:

Well, I am one that said up thread that there is no way the Bateses would let another child go through a public courtship break-up, but I was wrong. 

I noticed that while Nathan was sitting on Gil and Kelly's bed with his heart breaking, Kelly was waxing about how great it was that they could break up and remain friends and how that isn't the way it usually is.  So here is the score:

1 for "keeping our heart intact" courtship and

0 for "no purpose but to give away pieces of your heart" dating.      

 

Hope Nathan can learn from this and move on.  

I think this one actually normalizes them a bit. It feels like a real, normal breakup where hearts are broken. Whether it is all manufactured I don't know, but it feels somewhat normal. 

[OrchidBlossom]

19 minutes ago, Kaylo said:

I think this one actually normalizes them a bit. It feels like a real, normal breakup where hearts are broken. Whether it is all manufactured I don't know, but it feels somewhat normal. 

I mean I think it's just that courtship doesn't actually do shit for couples except keep their hymens intact/lips pure. If anything it pushes them to become emotionally attached to a person sooner because it is seen as a direct route to marriage and because you wanna bang so you get really attached to the idea of marrying them before you have a lot of deep knowledge.

Not that there is anything wrong with not having sex til marriage (I couldn't manage that but to each their own!). But the particular ways fundies do it set couples up for either too-quick marriages or devastation when they can't make things work after three months yet were already talking engagement.

[actuallyjessica]

If anyone has any links or transcripts of the clip, that would be much appreciated. I haven't seen anything from the new season and this break up is kind of a big deal.

[crazysnark]

All of the breakup clips are on uptv website

[EmainMacha]

But of course he could go and hang out with her in NYC if they'd broken up. They courted after all. No sinful dating. No broken heart pieces. So they can show how perfect courtship is. Even when it doesn't end in marriage there's no hurt feelings so everyone can join in fellowship like it never happened. Courtship for the win! Smh.

[Diana]

I watched that clip on uptv, poor boy he seems really devastated. I wonder if it was her who wanted the break up and not him, even if he said it was a mutual decision. Crazy to think she was expecting a marriage proposal in december, good that they didn't rush or it would have been worse. 

It's weird that he traveled to NY, but do we know if it was after the break up for sure? maybe they broke up during that travel but uptv decided to talk about it as soon as possible on the show so the timeline doesn't match. Or idk, maybe he wanted to give it a last try, since they talked about their parents breaking up lots of times before getting married.

[nickelodeon]

Yaaaaassss, Ashley, escape from those freaky people! Grab all the heart pieces and run!

[JermajestyDuggar]

I get to gloat! I knew when I saw that clip of them at the restaurant that this was serious. No fundie can act that well. And if they can, they need to go to Hollywood. And I knew the Bates would want to control the narrative. Kelly with her bullshit "you can still be friends!" Sure sure. And Zach and Sarah are such good friends.

Huge eyeroll....