Collin Gosselin has gone public with allegations that his mother, Kate Gosselin, drained more than $100,000 from a trust meant for him and his seven siblings.
The 22-year-old, who is currently competing on the fifth season of Fox’s “Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test,” made the claims during an exclusive interview’s “Virtual Reali-Tea” to promote his new memoir, “In the Shadow of Eight: Surviving the Reality of My Childhood,” He told the outlet he has seen documentation proving his mother took money from a collective trust established for the “Jon & Kate Plus 8” children.
“I want [my siblings] to hear this: I want them to know that, yes, she did take your money, she took all of our money, she took money from us,” Collin alleged. “She actually furnished her lake house in North Carolina with the money she took from me and my siblings.”
Collin noted that Kate “admitted” in court documents to taking the funds from her children, whom she shares with ex-husband Jon Gosselin. A 2019 court filing shows Kate acknowledged taking out two $50,000 payments from the kids’ trust, claiming the money was “borrowed” and being used to “meet her and the children’s expenses.” That same year, she purchased a $750,000 lake house in North Carolina.
As of August 2022, Jon claimed neither Collin nor his sister Hannah — the only two children in Jon’s custody at that time — had been repaid by Kate, despite a judge ruling she needed to make plans to reimburse the loans.
The financial allegations come as Collin details broader claims of abuse in his memoir, which is out now. He recounts how his mother allegedly isolated him from family members, zip-tied him, and forced him to take antipsychotic medications before having him institutionalized for nearly two years with little to no visitors. Collin attributes Kate’s alleged treatment to his disinterest in filming the family reality show, while Kate has accused him of having “special needs” and exhibiting “unpredictable behavior and violent tendencies.”
However, Collin writes that a psychiatric evaluation he allegedly had as an adult found no evidence of any “psychiatric diagnosis or behavior disorder.”
Regarding his siblings — Mady and Cara, both 26, and Alexis, Hannah, Aaden, Leah and Joel, all 22 — Collin writes that aside from Hannah, he has not seen or heard from any of them since he was 15. That was shortly after his father regained custody and removed him from the behavioral facility. Collin, who was pulled from school in the fourth grade after reporting the alleged abuse to a teacher, said he believes their estrangement is a direct result of Kate’s alleged manipulations.
He claimed his siblings likely remember him as “withdrawn” and “angry” from being home alone with Kate while everyone else went to school, noting that she allegedly “separated” him from his siblings, even forcing him to eat “meals alone at a huge, long dinner table.”
Because he was “reactive to the emotions” he was feeling as a child, he said it was “easy” for Kate to allegedly convince his siblings that he was “troubled.”
“I was manipulated to believe horrible things about my father, and that’s the same thing she did to them,” Collin alleged. “She manipulated the young minds of her children to perform and get with the program and believe what she wanted them to believe.”
Kate addressed her son’s abuse claims in a statement released via Instagram in July 2023.
“My son Collin, whom I love with all my heart, has received multiple psychiatric diagnoses over the years. 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 claimed at the time, referring to when she sent him to live in a behavioral health institution at 11 years old in 2016.
“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,” she continued.
“Collin’s distorted perception of reality is one of the many issues that he has always struggled with. 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.”
The statement concluded, “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.”
The family’s reality television history stretches back nearly two decades. “Jon & Kate Plus 8” documented the daily lives of two parents raising one set of twins and one set of sextuplets. The series aired on TLC for five seasons between 2007 and 2009, before rebranding to “Kate Plus 8” following Jon and Kate’s divorce. The spinoff ran for an additional six seasons and wrapped in 2017. Back in 2024, Jon claimed on “The Domenik Nati Show” that he was making “seven figures plus” before quitting the show, and alleged that his children likely benefited the most from the series as their earnings were “buried in trusts.”
A rep for Kate did not immediately respond to the outlet’s request for comment regarding Collin’s latest allegations.
Collin continues to compete on “Special Forces: World’s Toughest Test,” which airs Mondays on Fox.