Collin Gosselin is ready to move past the past — and possibly start anew with his controversial mother.
The 18-year-old former reality star is one of the infamous six Gosselin sextuplets from Jon & Kate Plus 8. His life has had some challenging moments thus far, including a period several years ago when his mom, Kate Gosselin, put him in an institution to deal with alleged behavioral issues. After leaving treatment, Collin went to live with his father, Jon Gosselin, severing his formerly close connection with his mom completely. Now we’re finally getting an update on where the estranged family members stand.
Related: Kate Was Once Accused Of Zip-Tying Collin To Chair & Making Him Sleep In Closet?!
On Monday morning, the teenager spoke about his difficult family situation. Sitting down with ET for an extremely rare interview, Collin got real about what happened after he was institutionalized. He also sounded remarkably optimistic about where things may go from here.
Speaking about his pre-institutionalization experiences with his mom, Collin told the outlet:
“After being there, I didn’t have a relationship with her. Even before [being] there, I don’t think we had much of a relationship and I think that just kept tearing it even more down.”
Now, with hindsight, Collin considers his family’s reality TV work to be the root of many issues. Speaking about his time on Jon & Kate Plus 8 — which became Kate Plus 8 after Kate divorced Jon and moved on with the show — Collin said:
“I want to believe [the rift] was because of TV and what being in the public eye does to a family. I think it tore us apart. It gave us less time to actually be together as a family, more time to be in the public eye.”
Inneresting. We don’t often think of it this way, but reality TV can be more of a production atmosphere that replaces actual family ties.
Collin got reflective about his younger years, telling the outlet on Monday that he thought his life experiences were “worse than” what the average teenager goes through. He explained his theories as to why, too. And it all comes back to Kate…
Related: Jon Shares Rare Photo Of Teens Hannah & Collin Together In High School
According to the 18-year-old, his famous momma had “her own agenda” to push while all eight children were growing up:
“It was worse than what you would say the average teenage kid goes through with their parent. I came to the conclusion that everybody has their own agenda, you know? My mom had her own agenda, and I don’t know exactly what that was. But I was put in a tough spot and my agenda was to make it out on top of that tough spot.”
Oof.
But through it all, Collin is optimistic. In fact, he told ET that it “would be ideal” for him to rekindle a relationship with Kate again at some point in the future:
“It’s unfortunate that we didn’t have a relationship. I think every son wants to have a relationship with their mom. But I’m doing very well.”
Acting in ways wise beyond his years, the teen concluded with some sage advice:
“In life we all go through hard things. We all get knocked down, we all experience really, really difficult things. But don’t sit around and mourn and cry about it. Address the situation you’re in and fix it and come out on top of it. Because resilience is a really important thing.”
Wow!
You can watch Collin’s full interview (below):
Are U surprised by Collin’s optimistic stance on Gosselin life following the fam’s turbulent reality TV years? Or are you more shocked that he’s apparently willing to reconcile with Kate even after being institutionalized?
Share your reactions to his new interview comments down (below)…
[Image via Michael Carpenter/WENN/ET/YouTube]
