So much for that TLC "gag order."
Jon Gosselin's much-anticipated sit-down with ABC's Chris Cuomo has arrived, and TV's most notorious reality dad is dishaing about all things Kate, the eight and all the post-split drama.
In the interview (which the network is milking for all it's worth on two episodes of Good Morning America and a prime-time special Tuesday), the Plus 8 patriarch says he was pushed to limit by a wife who was verbally abusive to him throughout their 10-year marriage.
"She'll call me like, almost like a 'lame fish,' " Gosselin grouses in the Q&A, which was taped back on Aug. 28. "Like I wasn't going anywhere. Well, excuse me, I'm taking care of the kids. She's on book tours, she's doing all these things. You know, she's gone a week. You know, comes back. Unpacks, repacks, does laundry, packs up and leaves again. And I'm standing there like, 'Oh, OK. Your mom's gone again.' But I took a lot of abuse from her. You know, I was put down."
The 32-year-old recalls one specific occasion when he got fed up and "stood up to Kate" for the first time, fighting for his right to party...
"In 10 years, I've never gone out...When she said, 'I don't want you going out,' I...I used to say, 'OK, I'm not going to go out.' I was very passive. This is the first time I said, 'You know what? I want to see my friends. I'm going out,'" Gosselin says.
"That was the first time in my life I ever stood up to Kate...I just felt like I had to take back some time in my life, and I did it. And I felt really good. I made my own decision...I was beaten down for so long, I couldn't even make my own decision. And when I did, I was like, holy cow! You know? Yeah, what's she gonna do? Divorce me? All right. Obviously. You know."
The former fun couple married when Jon was only 22, and he seems to be trying to make up for lost time.
"I had twins at 23. I had sextuplets at 27. Bye-bye, twenties," Gosselin says. "Raising all those kids until you're 30 and, you know, you don't even think about what's going on around you. You do what you got to do to survive."
But Jon says those survival strategies for their eight kids is not what ultimately doomed the marriage. Despite couples therapy sessions, he says, it was Kate's put-downs that made the relationship irreparable. Although Kate has claimed it was Jon who called it quits, Jon says the opposite was true.
"She made the first move. She knows the truth," Gosselin says. "I wish to God, she would speak from emotions...She's not speaking from the heart. Please— the stuff you tell me in private should be the stuff you tell me on TV."
The Gosselins are now living apart and sharing custody of their children, and
Jon says although his family has seen a positive change in him since the split, the divorce has still taken its toll on him.
"I've cried more now in the last, like, eight months...than my entire life," Jon said. "Our relationship will never be fixed... I don't trust her anymore. I was abused...I was beaten down...I'm not going back to that life style."
The ABC interview with "America's Favorite Father" airs Tuesday night at 10 p.m. the special Primetime: Family Secrets. Exceprts from the session will be split between Tuesday and Wednesday's installments of Good Morning America.
We bet Kate's already set her TiVo.
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Get up to speed on all the Gosselin drama, and don't forget to take a look at the Reality of Jon & Kate photo gallery.