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COLLIN Gosselin has posted an emotional open message to his family members after becoming estranged from his siblings.
The 21-year-old shot to fame as a child alongside his brothers and sisters in the reality show, Jon and Kate Plus 8, which followed the Gosselin family as they raised sextuplets and twins.
However, since the show aired, Collin has largely become estranged from most of his family, accusing mom Kate of treating him differently and leaving him to grow up feeling alone.
But Collin has now posted a new photo reaching out to those he no longer keeps in touch with, reflecting on “the lives they could’ve lived” if they were never part of the reality TV circuit.
Sharing two photos – one of the whole family as kids, another alone in his car – set to Adele’s weepy ballad Hometown Glory, Collin wrote: “Born to be a team, us against the world… forced to do it alone, and wonder every day what our lives could’ve looked like…”
In the caption he added: “Forced apart, pitted against each other. All the fame and money in the world, but what about kids being kids?
“I will always love them more than anything. The tears I shed behind closed doors, thinking about the memories we could’ve shared. I love you guys…”
The show initially ran from 2007 to 2009, before being picked up again after Jon and Kate’s divorce in 2009, rebranded to Kate Plus 8 and running from 2015 to 2017.
Collin was one of the sextuplets alongside siblings Alexis, Hannah, Aaden, Leah, and Joel. Twins Cara and Madelyn, both 24, completed Jon and Kate’s brood.
When the couple divorced, Kate was given full custody of all eight children – but in 2018 Jon was granted sole custody of his son, three years after Collin was sent to Fairmount Behavioral Health Institute – a residential program for kids with behavioral needs.
Speaking to The US Sun last year, Collin said he believes he never had any behavioral issues or psychiatric conditions, sharing private medical records with us to back his claim up.
He also accused his mother of taking out her anger about her failing marriage on him – alleging he would be isolated from his siblings, and on some occasions have his hands and feet zip-tied and be locked in a specially-built basement room that contained only a bed and cameras to watch him for a whole day or part of a day.
TLC star Collin Gosselin tells how mom Kate ‘zip-tied his arms and legs & locked him in basement’
Collin’s claims were supported by dad Jon Gosselin, who said the alleged abuse took place after he and Kate divorced and he moved out of their home in Pennsylvania.
Shortly after custody of Collin was granted to Jon, Hannah also moved in with her father, who also supported her brothers allegations in an interview for Vice’s ‘The Dark Side of the 2000s’ documentary, which aired in 2023.
The family have been split ever since, with Collin losing contact with his remaining six siblings and mom.
Kate did not respond to the claims in our interview, but her lawyer Richard Puleo, who represented her in her last case against Jon, said he did not believe she’d done anything to “intentionally harm” Collin.
He added that “she did what she did to protect herself and her family” from what he alleged was “troubled behavior” by Collin.
Following the airing of Dark Side of the 2000s, Kate posted a statement on Instagram, which is now deleted, defending her decision to have him admitted into an institution for his behavior.
“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,” she wrote.
“Fast forward to the present day, and following Jon’s removal of Collin from treatment, my son’s unpredictable and violent behavior has sadly continued regularly towards Jon, Hannah and others around him.
Claiming Collin has “a distorted perception of reality”, Kate said she worked alongside a pediatric psychiatrist and a team of specialists to try and help him.
She continued: “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.”
