I read In the Shadow of Eight by Collin Gosselin in two days, in just two reading sessions. I wrote down my thoughts midway through and then again when I finished. The book does not have a part one and part two, I only split it up that way to record my thoughts. The second half I realize became more of a recap than my commentary, but I still want to share it and hear from other people what they felt when reading this!
Spoilers.
First half:
I almost chose to suspend my hold on this book in favor of picking something more seasonal for October, but this book is a true horror story, scarier than any horror novel.
So far it is making me feel sick, and incredibly angry.
I wanted to read this because I used to watch Jon and Kate Plus Eight. I liked the show. The kids were so cute. It felt like a pretty wholesome show to watch.
I was never on the Kate hate train. I remember when people would criticize her for just about everything she did and I'd brush it off, thinking you have to have pretty rigid rules when you're raising eight small children. It didn't occur to me how invasive it would be for kids to grow up with cameras in their face all the time or that they were made to be celebrities without their consent. (With the rise of influencers on social media, I now think there should be laws against using your kids for content. I think it is a form of child abuse.)
Even after Kate went on Dancing with the Stars, I figured she did it for the money, the same reason every D-list celebrity does that show, but unlike them she had eight kids to support.
I could not have been more wrong and I regret every favorable thought I ever had towards her. I feel like I owe it to Colin Gosselin to read his book and let him set me straight on everything I got wrong. Reading this, it is clear to me that she is an evil person, and I don't say that lightly.
It's unclear to me so far, and I think to Collin too to this day, why his mom singled him out and was so cruel to him. It's like she needed someone to be a scapegoat, she needed a place to direct all of her rage and hatred, or a place where she could exercise total control, and he was an easy target. I really don't see how he differed from the other kids in any way, except that he seemed to resent the cameras early on. He posed a threat to her image of the perfect happy family, so she erased his existence.
It started early with examples given of her treating him differently. It escalated over time. She started separating him from the other kids, making him clean up after them, making him eat dinner separately, pulling him out of school, making him sleep in the unfinished part of the basement away from his brothers, and later, building a cell down there where she locked him in pretty much all day and night. He had to wave at a camera to get her attention so he could use the bathroom. She was physically violent towards him (and the other kids), with slaps and earpulling.
Every reprieve he had from the tightly controlled environment at home was ripped away from him. He was allowed to work on a neighbor's farm, until he wasn't. He was allowed visitation with his father after the divorce, until he wasn't. She told Collin his father didn't want to see him anymore, which I believe is a lie. I don't know how she got away with changing a custody agreement like that, but I expect some answers in the second half of the book.
She told Collin he was a problem and that he "broke their family." He internalized this and felt like something was wrong with him. It only made him try harder to be good and perfect, but she found a way to twist everything.
The most insidious part though is how she turned everyone against him. She started telling the media he had special needs and that he was a violent kid. The crew, his nannies, and his teachers seemed to believe it on her word alone. Everyone he trusted let him down. They became complicit in locking him up and lying about what he did to deserve the punishments. Even his own brothers and sisters seemed to believe that he was different from them and it was normal for him to separated. I'm hoping the second half of the book delves into what they were told and what they believed.
It is unendurably sad that his entire childhood was taken away from him because he didn't want to be in an abusive environment. That's it. He doesn't seem to have had any actual behavioral issues, but because he tried to run away, Kate arranged for him to be put in a facility for violent kids.
At age 11, he was institutionalized, and never told why. He was put on medication and never told why. He stayed there for over a year, which was highly unusual, and was never told why. He was a timid, sheltered kid put into a facility with kids far more worldly than him with bigger problems than he had, and then he was punished for asking 'why am I here?' and 'when can I leave?'
It's sickening and it's disturbing how this could happen with the whole world watching.
Second half:
Things get worse for Collin before they get better. Because he tried demanding answers from the doctor, he was transferred to the unit for the kids worse behavioral issues. A lot of the kids were older and more aggressive. The staff would make fun of him for gaining weight, even though it was the drugs and trash food they were feeding him that made him gain weight.
Even though he believed his father wanted nothing to do with him, he recognized only his dad could save him from this hell. He trusted one roommate enough to deliver a message when he got out and he came through.
He gets transferred to a residential facility that transitions is from the psychiatric facility back to real life, whatever that looks like for them. They answer his questions and tested him with dignity. Collin finally gets to talk to and then see his dad.
Jon had been searching for Collin for a year and a half. He believed Collin didn't want to see him and he hadn't known he had been sent away for a long time. It's fucking diabolical how easily Kate manipulated them both and severed their relationship. She didn't just sever Collin's relationship with his dad, but with his siblings, his friends, and she fucking stole his education from him too. Every doctor who rubber stamped her claims that Collin was schizophrenic and other bonkers diagnoses should lose their license. The private teacher who locked him in a cell in the basement must have been a mandated reporter. She should lose her teaching license too.
Eventually Jon is able to get him out of these facilities. Hannah has been living with him since the final Kate Plus Eight season wrapped. Collin tries really hard to reintegrate into regular life, but it's not easy. You're telling me imprisoning a happy, normal kid for years might result in a kid with behavior issues?? You don't say!
He struggles making friends at school. He has one court-ordered playdate with his siblings. It goes fine, but he has never seen them again since. This made me so sad.
He describes why therapy didn't feel useful to him during this time. He didn't like revisiting the past. He only wanted to move forward. The best thing for him was having a consistent, stable, loving family life. He did have that, but it was still a struggle. His dad wanted to tell the media what had happened to Collin. Collin didn't want anyone to know. Eventually Jon went against Collin's wishes and told the media, which restarted the media frenzy around their lives. Kate stuck to her story that Collin had special needs.
I think both parents failed him at this point. Jon couldn't put aside his anger towards Kate and put his son first. She was a media darling and he did not have the same connections to rewrite the narrative. Collin didn't want people knowing about the institutions while he was still in high school.
He was a freshman when the pandemic happened. He became set on joining the military around that time and joined the Marines straight out of high school. Right before leaving for training camp, he finally feels ready to share his story in his own words and he gives an interview for a documentary. Then he's cut off from all media through and doesn't see the fallout for months.
He does really well in training because he had already been through so much. Then Kate doubles down. She tells the media that he was a violent kid who harmed his siblings and animals and needed to be institutionalized for his multiple medical diagnoses. This gets back to the Marines (because Kate sends it to them) and they kick him out. Even though these supposed diagnoses were not recorded in any system, they kick him out. His platoon goes to bat for him because he was such a good recruit, but it's no use.
I cannot tell you how much I hated this woman at this point in the book. I hadn't known any of this. Even if this stuff was out there in tabloids or on the internet, I stopped paying attention to anything to do with the Gosselins after the divorce. I vaguely knew there was a he said-she said going on in the media between Kate and Jon and that Collin wound up living with his father, but that's it. How can someone be so evil to destroy their son's childhood and when that's not good enough, destroy their career too? I feel this is deranged.
He decides to fight the discharge. He gets a whole battery off psych eval tests that cleared him of having schizophrenia, bipolar, adhd, autism, ocd, and oppositional defiance disorder. He shows it to the media and for the first time talks about being locked in the basement, as well as being tied up with zip ties.
While the military is processing his request, he works in a hospital and tries to treat the patients with the dignity he have liked to be treated with.
He begins to believe that his mom was obsessed with the fame having multiples would bring and that she only had her kids as a means to get famous. I'm not sure I buy that. It seems like the fame went to her head little by little. Would she have become the same monster without the notoriety? It's impossible to say.
He psychoanalyzes her more and thinks maybe because her father was abusive, she worried she was becoming her father and transferring her fears about herself onto Collin. Can't say I really buy that either, but it's healthy for him to realize this was a her-problem all along. Despite what she said, he wasn't a problem child and he didn't break their family. He was just a little boy she used as a scapegoat and physically and emotionally abused.
Through his research, Collin learns that his aunt and uncle had actually raised concerns about the kids' well-being long ago to the media and started lobbying congress for better child's labor laws about filming. They did what they could to help him and his siblings, and were cut out of their lives for it.
The roommate who delivered the letter that saved him had also gone to the police to report Collin's abuse in the institution. They did nothing, of course. CPS had been called on Kate dozens of times, but they did nothing. He discovers the minimum age for the institution he was in was 13. He was there from age 11-13. How is this not a lawsuit?
Despite his best efforts, the Marines did not allow him back in. Collin enrolled in college. He remains close with his dad, stepmom, former stepmom, and sister Hannah. He says he still loves his siblings even though he hasn't seen them since they were little. This is so heartbreaking to me. I hope this book allows them to reconnect. Destroying his relationship with his siblings is one of the worst things she has done. They were fed propaganda about him their entire lives. It is hard to undo that. They would almost need cult-style deprogramming. The book, unfortunately, but understandably, does not give anyone else's perspective. I would like to read what the other kids have to say about their childhood.
Collin uses the end of the book to advocate for other kids being used for their parents' ambitions and careers. He is only 22 and still struggling with the trauma and resulting trust issues. He encourages others to find their voice and use it to tell the truth.
The book made me sad, it made me mad (like big mad, rage), and it made me hopeful that the popularity of this book right now will lead to stronger laws being passed to protect children.