The more time has passed the more I see Jon Gosselin as a sympathetic figure. I get why Kate left him, he’s an ass, but I also find her insufferable. Jon acted out with various girlfriends and playing at being a celebrity, but when that went away and he ended up with very little. He also never had a chance at having a relationship with most of his kids. We just heard that Jon had earned full custody of son Colin, who has been away at a residential facility for years but is getting out this Christmas. Plus one of the other sextuplets, Hannah, lives with him. However his six other kids, the four other 14 year-old sextuplets and the two 18 year-old twins, won’t even take his calls. You know why that is. Jon talked to outlets at an event for WE tv’s Real Love and he said he just hopes that one day they can all hang out.
Jon admitted that it’s been about a year since he saw all eight of his children together and told Us their last meeting was “not good,” adding, “It was just volatile and a lot going on. It was just not a good time. Like, forced custody and all that kind of stuff.”
He and the Kate Plus 8 star, 43, were married for a decade before splitting in 2009. Originally they were awarded shared physical custody of their children, with Kate granted full legal custody of their now 14-year-old sextuplets Collin, Hannah, Leah, Alexis, Joel and Aaden and now 18-year-old twins Cara and Mady. But things changed this year when Hannah began living with her dad in February and Jon was awarded sole custody of Collin on December 4. “She wanted her brother to come home,” he said of Hannah’s relationship with Collin, who has been in a residential program for kids with behavioral problems and is due to leave soon…
“[Leah, Alexis, Joel and Aaden] aren’t talking to me, but they’re talking to Hannah. I don’t get involved now with what the kids … it’s what the kids want to do. If they don’t want to talk to me, that’s fine, as long as they keep up with their sibling connections… Eventually, if they come around and they want to talk to me, that’s cool.”
Asked if he has a relationship with his twins, who are headed to college, Jon responded, “I don’t know. I hope so. You never know.”
Jon isn’t giving up hope of mending fences and makes it clear that he is just a phone call away when it comes to all of his children. “[In a perfect world] I’d have just like, a normal relationship with my children, meaning, just communication. It wouldn’t have to be all lovey-dovey. Just like, ‘How you guys doing? Where are you going to college?’ Maybe call me for advice. Like, hey, I’m thinking about going to this school, college, whatever. With Madelyn and Cara, because when I think back, like, I was part of their life a little, and then all of a sudden there was nothing, you know what I mean? And just with the other four, just like, ‘Hey, you guys wanna go bowling or something?’ So we can spend time all together,” he tells Us, before adding, “Just to start off small.
That’s so sad! He can’t even call his kids. It’s good they’re still speaking to Hannah but her relationship with her siblings must be strained. Also can you imagine how Kate treats Hannah after she left to live with Jon? It speaks volumes that Kate didn’t even come to the final hearing determining custody of Colin. Maybe he’s a complete jerk too and is worse behind the scenes. Jon also told US that he refused to sign off on an order allowing his kids to appear on a show with Kate in which she was looking for love called Kate Plus Date. It was announced earlier this year but hasn’t aired. I can’t help but think that all Kate’s parental alienation worked and that it cost those kids a relationship with their dad. Unless it’s an abusive situation, that’s family and you put aside your own grudges with the person to make sure your kid can see them.
John has been with his girlfriend, Colleen Conrad, for four years and she has teenagers too. He’s said they’ve talked about an engagement.
Hannah is a twin, not one of the sextuplets.
Not true, Hannah is a sextuplet. The twins are Mady and Cara.
“Like, hey, I’m thinking about going to this school, college, whatever. With Madelyn and Cara,…”
Those are the twins, not Hannah.
STOP TRYING TO CONFUSE ME
lmao
You know, I view him fairly similarly as Thomas Markle. He was very uninvolved with the kids when he was around, and had YEARS to repair the relationship when he had scheduled custody. He trash-talked their mom to anyone who would listen for years, and from reports around that time I remember reading he wouldn’t always take them when it was his scheduled custodial time, so he was constantly letting them down and wanted nothing to do with them because he was busy partying and dating inappropriately-aged women. He left his frazzled, kinda-crazy ex wife with EIGHT KIDS to support ALONE (he didn’t send child support either, IIRC). And now, years and years and years later, he complains they want nothing to do with him Yes, Hannah came back, but it must be all sunshine and daisies for him to raise ONE of his eight kids, and yeah he’s probably much more attentive with her since he has only ONE kid to spend time with vs the eight Kate had to try to wrangle. And he wasn’t even around to help when Colin was having trouble in the first place, but now he’s lining up to care for him after his extensive treatment and will probably pat himself on the back for his improvements.
I don’t like Kate either, but I don’t think any of us would do much better in her shoes. I feel bad for her, and I hope her kids are thankful (even though she’s clearly made a ton of mistakes, she always gives me the vibe that she tries her best for them)
I’m not saying he didn’t mess up but I think you’re giving Kate too much credit here. When they first started airing the show, wasn’t Jon the one doing most of the stuff for the kids? And she was straight up awful to him on camera, I can’t imagine what it was like when the cameras were off. And I imagine the parental alienation started pretty early on, so having a relationship with the kids probably wasn’t easy. Not to say that he should’ve done the things he did and I believe the kids have full rights to be angry and resentful of him for it, but I think we need to look at the whole picture and not paint Kate as some kind of stressed out mom doing her best when she’s on camera treating her husband and kids like garbage and stuff.
No, he wasn’t. Kate did EVERYTHING- the scheduling, the cooking, the caring, everything. However, they had that setup- he worked, she cared for the kids. What I saw was 100% spousal abuse, but it also was kinda understandable (as much as such thing can be). Jon was emotionally distant and didn’t really help Kate unless she practically screamed at him to do something specifically. He was like another kid for her. Like…she was absolutely awful, full stop. But I remember watching and being like DANG IT JON JUST HELP HER WITH THE DISHES, DUDE. FEED ONE KID. DO SOMETHING.
I don’t doubt there’s some parental alienation, but Jon certainly didn’t help his case by not picking his kids up when he was supposed to have them, and not helping Kate financially, and badmouthing her all over the world. Kate’s awful but frankly, to me Jon is worse.
In the beginning he was a great dad. I remember him serving Queen Kate her coffee in bed as he was off to work. I hated her parenting and it was embarrassing to watch her emasculate Jon. It appeared the 4 year twins were doing the lion’s share of work until Jon came home. Once she started getting her tv specials, had her operation to lose the belly fat and the God awful haircut, Jon was basically out of the picture. He screwed up a couple of years. I think he redeemed himself. He loves his son, while Kate can’t cope with anything, including her child, that isn’t perfect. She’s a wicked woman and I hope the other kids can find their way out. Colin and Hannah are the only two that will know any kind of normalcy. They would have been better off without reality television. She insisted she could never be a nurse again….not if it meant losing TLC $. She doesn’t just hate Jon, she also disowned her parents and siblings. No pity from me, except for the kids, like always.
Jon did help out as much as possible when he wasn’t at work I watched their show for the very beginning Kate had a lot help with sextuplets she had church volunteers helping her out from the morning until the mid afternoon. Kate wasn’t this super mom do everything alone she had plenty of help from her community to the point where the kids where calling a volunteer grandma becaus that how involved the helpers had become don’t be fool the moment TLC came along the volunteers where push to the back and never acknowledge by Kate or the tv crew . Jon helped a lot Too Jon not perfect but he was a big part of those kids lives . Kate was a complete control freak to the point where she have mini meltdown over the dumbest things like when they all went to Disney world and the sextuplets got ice cream on themselves she loses it or the time she throw fit because Jon allowed the kids to pick out their own outfits and they didn’t match .
Yep. The kids not speaking to him did not just happen in a vacuum.
When I first saw this show, I saw spousal abuse. Kate was absolutely awful to Jon. Sh seems like quite a terror.
Kate is such a control freak, I am sure those children are emotionally abused. She probably sent Colin away because he resisted her. She has those kids programmed. They are going to need lots of therapy when they leave the house.
I’m not excuse if Jon for his behavior but when he escaped from his marriage, he did go off the deep end with his life choices.
I’m glad that that poor boy is going to have a more normal life. Seems like Jon might have gotten himself together and has a stable relationship. That will help the kids.
” She probably sent Colin away because he resisted her. ”
I really don’t think that’s how psychiatric facilities work. And they have kept him for YEARS. They wouldn’t just do that because Colin was annoying his mom. From what I remember, he was literally expelled from the school he attended with the other kids, although we never found out why. I think he was expelled from two schools. So…blaming Kate for that is pretty nasty.
Abuse is never understandable or excusable. And, as someone pointed out down thread, Kate drove away MANY people like family and volunteers with her actions. Again, I’m not excusing Jon for how he acted but, in my opinion, he broke out of an abusive relationship and I think that makes things more complicated. And before people say “omg why didn’t he get the kids out then?!” We all know that leaving an abusive relationship is complicated as hell and is only more so when the abuser is the parent of your children. There is a balance there that you hope the courts get right.
You couldn’t be more wrong. Jon paid in excess of $20K PER MONTH for the first two years after the divorce. Once his reality TV career earnings (and job possibilities) dried up, child support was waived by Kate. After all, she was being supported by her kids, an option he didn’t have (and didn’t want). The divorce was aided and abetted by TLC, who provided the funds and the lawyers to fight Jon every time he tried to get more time with his kids. They orchestrated the media campaign that labeled him a cheater, while at the same time protecting Kate, who was doing her own running around (bodyguard? riiiight).
There’s a lot more to this story than what the tabloids have published, and virtually all of it was manipulated by the network that kept Kate on their payroll all these years. And now the party’s over for Kate. She was never the main attraction, people loved the kids and tolerated her, and now she can’t use the “Plus 8” anymore to attract them to her new show. Let’s see if, under those conditions, it ever airs. Don’t get me wrong, Jon’s certainly not blameless, but Kate has proven to be a classic parental alienator, and she’s done it to ensure the children’s father would not have the ability to interfere with her TV ambitions, which, sadly for Kate, was always dependent on their kids.
They’re both shitty parents, and ultimately, they will both reap the results of their bad decisions down the line when the kids are older, more independent, and have the space and time to recognize the wrongs done against them.
^^^^^this
I used to watch their show Jon was such a loving father to all the kids I will never forget the episode when the sextuplets were sick and Colin throw up . And Kate left him in the laundry room on the cold titles floor because she couldn’t deal with him anymore Jon came Home and found Colin on the floor and flip out on Kate . I knew Kate was a horrible human being their a reason why no one in her family speaks to her she destroyed her kids relationship with their uncle and aunt she cut Jon mother out the kids life’s because a disagreement and the volunteers who help with the sextuplets where also cut off too. Kate has successfully turn Those kids against Jon making him out to be the bad guy he fought to get those kids off tv so they can live a normal life and he made out to be a monster by the media and Kate . Jon is not perfect but he loves his kids and it’s sad that he been cut out of their lives.
I agree.
From what I recall, her control issues turned her into an abusive monster. She treated him as if he were utterly incompetent because he didn’t do things exactly as she wanted them done, so she assumed responsibility for everything and it turned her into a vicious harpy. Her anger increased, and she took it out on everyone, in an abusive fashion, and he withdrew. What a horrible cycle. I’m sure she bad mouthed him regularly when he dropped out of their lives, and I also bet that she insinuated to those kids that *she was exhausted, all the time, doing everything in the house for everyone,* expressly for the purpose of guilting those kids into believing everything and following her lead alienating their father.
I don’t condone what he did. I don’t condone what she did. I remember watching it and being horrified. The above impression has stayed with me for about 15 years.
Famous for nothing except giving birth and a dreadful TV show- oh wait, that’s the Kardashians.
I always found it wierd that Jon never got offered by Kate to take Collin and instead just shipped him off. They were talking about Kate over in narc life on Reddit because she has all the classic symptoms of a narcissist. That being said I was reading in an article that it was the court appointed attorney who suggested that Jon get custody of Collin instead of Kate.
O.o
The fact that complete strangers know anything more about this family since being off the air is disgusting. I feel so incredibly sorry for those kids.
Kate is a classic narcissist. In her fucked up mind, her children are just extensions of herself, not individuals with their own needs, like privacy, choices, freedom and a relationship with their father. I have so much compassion for those kids, who never had a choice in any of this mess.
What is interesting is that the only one that seems to keep the family in the spotlight is Jon. He says that he doesn’t want his kids to be on TV or in the news yet he keeps them there. He is always talking about them to someone. Both parents are awful, but he seems a bit hypocritical right now.
Wow, I love his new girlfriend! He’s always been a really sympathetic character, despite his Kate Major phase (CRINGE). Hope he finds happiness and peace.
It became very difficult to watch the show very quickly. She was awful to him and it only got worse, he’d wake up and do lots for the kids while she was a control freak emasculating him screaming at him like he was a dog. Criticized his breathing in an interview once. Old flashbacks of earlier episodes would shock me at how nice she used to be to him. He was not blameless of course, remember when he hung out with Lindsay lohan’s dad? that spoke volumes about jon- but not showing up for your sons court date? That is inexcusable to me. How will your son not see that as a sign of how little you care?
I was raised by a woman with narcissistic personality disorder and part of that is triangulation-bad mouthing someone to another to pit them against each other. I’ve had roommates do this who clearly get off on manipulation: one would badmouth the other roommate to me, then when I was gone she’d badmouth me to the other roommate. My mother badmouthed my father constantly; she’d start off saying, ‘you know, I don’t mean to badmouth your father-‘ then she’d go right on and do it. I called her on it once, interrupting her saying, ‘but you will.’ And she screamed at me. He was blamed for things he had no involvement in. If narcissists can’t control you they try to control your image, so that’s another reason to constantly badmouth. It’s gaslighting to convince you of a reality that is convenience for them.
I hope each kid was set up with a college fund. They are at the age they need it and deserve it.
I just can’t look at that fake smiling face. It’s like Hop Sing and Howdy Doody had an illegitimate love child.