Collin Gosselin gave an ET interview the week of his book release and directly addressed his mom Kate Gosselin in a powerful on-camera message.
Speaking directly into the camera, he told Kate, “Mom, if you’re watching this, I want to say that everything I went through as a kid, I did not deserve it. And you should have done better as a mother.”
Collin’s book shares the heartbreaking details of his childhood and his fraught relationship with Kate, which he says broke down after she became intolerant of the fact the he did not always want to participate in filming their reality shows “Jon & Kate Plus 8” and the spinoff “Kate Plus 8.”
Collin Gosselin Shares How He Feels About His Mom: ‘I Really Do Love Her’
A few moments earlier in the above clip, the 22-year-old, who became a reality TV star along with his siblings at just two years old, responded to a question whether he still loves his mom.
“I think I love memories of my mom. You know, before she changed, I guess,” he answered while fighting back tears. “I think I really do love her. I think of so many memories with her, and I think a part of me always wants that. I think a part of people, they always want that. When there’s broken relationships with parents, they always want that. You always want that.”
Collin Gosselin Says He Was Exploited for TV
“I was not wrong for feeling the way I did about being exploited every day. She’s never, ever thought or voiced, ‘Maybe I was wrong. Maybe I took it too far. Maybe I wanted a paycheck and it was easy, and I took it too far. And I put them out there too much. And I didn’t listen to them when they didn’t wanna be filmed.'”
As a part of his promotional activities for his book, “In the Shadow of Eight,” Collin visited Jay Shetty’s podcast, where he shared the tale of how he was finally freed from the behavioral institution his mom admitted him to when he was 11, and only visited him once during his 21-month stay.
He says he secretively wrote the famous crayon-etched letter begging his dad Jon to come get him out of the lockup which first surfaced in the media back in 2019.
He said at the time, he felt that “nobody really wanted me to get out.” He says he enlisted a kid named Zach who was being discharged to help him smuggle the note out of the facility and get it to Jon. Zach ended up hiding the note, which Collin folded up to be tiny, in his underwear. Collin asked Zach to find Jon’s social media and “reach out to him, and tell him where I am and that the needs to come get me.” He says he found the address of the facility on a brochure that was laying around. Jon and Collin say Kate kept the location a secret from Jon the entire time.
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Collin Gosselin Directly Addresses Mom Kate in Brave & Powerful Message: ‘You Should Have…’