Jon and Kate Gosselin’s Son Collin Opens up About Being Institutionalized

Jon and Kate Gosselin’s son Collin was institutionalized in his early teen years, and now the high schooler is opening up about the experience. During an exclusive interview with ET’s Kevin Frazier, Collin recalled the difficult time, sharing, “It was definitely hard, like, not being in the media to kind of explain everything ’cause, you know, I wanted to take time for myself and I wasn’t able to give the truthful answers.”

“I mean, there were just things out there, you know, not my words — other people’s words,” he continued. “It was tough, but, you know, it’s good now to be able to put my own word out there.” The 18-year-old also shared that, around 2016, he was involuntarily checked into two different mental health facilities. “Institution — scary place, but I learned a lot about myself,” he said, eventually explaining why he reached out to his father for help. “I was in a dark place mentally,” Collin recalls. “I think being in a place like that does more damage than it helps you.”

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Additionally, during his conversation with Frazier, Collin also revealed that he hasn’t seen most of his siblings in years. Collin’s estrangement from his mom and siblings started, he says, when Kate admitted him to a mental health facility. It was originally believed that she did this in 2017, but new comments from the teen indicate it was earlier. “I have not spoken with my siblings in probably five or six years now,” Collin shared. “It’s tough.” Collin is one of the famous Gosselin sextuplets who also have two older twin sisters.

“I would love for us to come together one day, have dinner together, talk,” he later added, “just have a relationship and catch up on the things that we lost, the time that we lost.” While he does want to mend his relationship with his siblings, Collin made it clear that he does not feel it’s his responsibility to make extend the first olive branch. 

“I haven’t reached out to them, they haven’t reached out to me,” he said. “I want to respect their space and their time and respect how they feel about everything, so I’m kind of just waiting for the day that they reach out. I don’t want to reach out. I don’t want to invade their space. I’d rather just let them do it on their own terms.”