Being YouTube-famous may seem glamorous, but as Dude Perfect star Tyler Toney and his wife Bethany recently shared in an “I Am Second” video series, it can be anything but.
Tyler’s success as a content creator almost caused the failure of his marriage. Nevertheless, in the video series, titled “Not as Easy as It Looks,” Tyler and Bethany described how God has worked to redeem not only their marriage but also the platform that almost drove them apart—a platform that Tyler now leverages to publicly share his faith.
Dude Perfect, which stars Tyler alongside his former Texas A&M roommates Cory and Coby Cotton, Garrett Hilbert, and Cody Jones, is a sports and comedy themed YouTube channel. With 58.9 million subscribers, Dude Perfect is the second most subscribed sports channel and the 23rd most subscribed channel on YouTube overall.
At the beginning of the testimonial, Tyler shared that he met his fellow Dude Perfect stars in 2009 while attending college.
“We were in a Bible study together. We were playing basketball at the rec; ended up living together,” Tyler recounted. “And we were always competing, always having fun, trying to figure out a game to play or a competition to have, making, you know, bets with each other, whatever it may be.”
These competitions were the genesis of the Dude Perfect YouTube channel, which quickly garnered the attention of Good Morning America and launched them into stardom.
Tyler described his fellow Dude Perfect stars as more brothers than friends, because “we probably spend more time with each other than we do our families.”
When Tyler and Bethany got married, Dude Perfect was still a side gig. However, Tyler soon quit his job to pursue it as his full-time career. Bethany also would go through a career change herself.
“So we were both in a place where we both were so fulfilled with what we were doing,” Bethany expressed.
Nevertheless, life wasn’t perfect. As the couple attempted to start their family, they experienced the tragedy of multiple miscarriages.
“It was just devastating to me, and heartbreaking, because I’m watching my husband be on top of the world, doing all these really cool things, where I’m at home in pain and just heartbroken and confused and angry,” Bethany said. “I was so angry at God during that season of our life because I just felt like God was ignoring me and that he wasn’t hearing my requests for things.”
Bethany expressed that her bitterness toward God continued even as the couple welcomed their first son into the world. Her pain also soon turned to resentment toward Tyler.
For his part, Tyler admitted that in his effort to “make hay while the sun is shining” in terms of capitalizing on the success of Dude Perfect, he didn’t manage “it the best as far as a family perspective of making Bethany a priority.”
Speaking about himself and his Dude Perfect costars, Tyler said, “Our families got kind of put on the back burner.”
Later, the couple would welcome their second child into the world. The following week, Tyler went on tour with Dude Perfect.