Collin Gosselin, 22, has accused his mother Kate Gosselin, 51, of dragging him across rooms by his ear during his childhood.
The former “Jon & Kate Plus 8” star detailed the alleged physical abuse in a new memoir and accompanying interview while promoting the book. He claimed the ear-grabbing left him with visible injuries, including one school day where he arrived with a swollen ear.
In “In the Shadow of Eight: Surviving the Reality of My Childhood,” released Tuesday, Collin wrote that the ear-pulling became a recurring pattern whenever his mother grew angry. “She would grab me by the ear,” he wrote, describing how “a snappy pull could turn into a smack to the side of my head.” He also alleged that the same side of his face would become “purple, bruised, tender to the touch.”
Collin said he believes he was singled out by Kate, but he also witnessed what he described as mistreatment directed at his siblings while the family grew up in front of cameras. “When I was in the home, I’d witness horrible mental, emotional, and verbal abuse against my siblings, not just myself, of what I can imagine was their emotions and reactions to being on TV as well,” he claimed.
“I voiced it the most, but I know that does not mean that my other siblings did not feel it as well,” Collin continued. “There’d be normal temper tantrums that me and my siblings would have, and I’d see them having, like I said, what I could imagine was being in front of the cameras. And the way my mom would react to them, she would manipulate them into just basically disregarding their emotions and making them feel like it was their fault.”
He further alleged in the book that corporal punishment was common across the household. “She spanked all of us frequently. And she did it hard.”
Kate addressed earlier abuse claims in a September 2024 statement, defending her decision to send Collin to a behavioral health institution when he was 11. “My son Collin, whom I love with all my heart, has received multiple psychiatric diagnoses over the years,” she wrote. “For the safety of myself, his brothers and sisters and for his own well-being, he was placed in a facility following years of outpatient treatment which proved insufficient for his needs.”
She continued, “The decision to admit him was made by emergency room doctors following one of his many attacks/outbursts—this one involving his use of a weapon. Fast forward to the present day, and following Jon’s removal of Collin from treatment, my son’s unpredictable and violent behaviors have sadly continued regularly towards Jon, Hannah and others around him.”
Kate also challenged Collin’s credibility. “Collin’s distorted perception of reality is one of the many issues that he has always struggled with,” she wrote. “As many people who have family members grappling with mental health issues can attest, it is rarely and sadly surprising when complete fabrications occur, and this is just another heartbreaking facet of this fight.”
She concluded in part, “Unfortunately, I believe Collin remains a very troubled young man who continues to need a lot of help. His brothers and sisters and I have not been directly involved in his life due to his history of unpredictable behavior and violent tendencies towards us.”
Collin has disputed Kate’s characterization, claiming she abused and institutionalized him because he did not want to participate in the family’s reality shows. His father Jon Gosselin, 49, obtained legal and physical custody of Collin in 2018 after removing him from the facility. Jon also gained custody of Hannah, while the remaining sextuplets—Aaden, Joel, Alexis and Leah—continued living with Kate along with older twin sisters Mady and Cara, 25.
The Gosselin family became household names through “Jon & Kate Plus 8,” which followed the Pennsylvania couple raising their twin daughters and sextuplets. Kate and Jon married in June 1999, and she filed for divorce a decade later in June 2009; the split was finalized that December. The show chronicled the children’s early years until the marital breakdown ended the original series.
Collin has been estranged from his mother since 2016. He currently stars in Season 5 of Fox’s “Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test.”