Kate Gosselin has had enough.
The mom of eight appears on The Dr. Oz Show Thursday and opens up about how fake tabloid headlines have not only taken a toll on her mental health but also her physical well-being. "I could live my whole life without them. I'm a very visual person, so your emotional and psychological energy, like, I do actually, picture it as like a barrel of energy, this stuff just eats—it drags you down," she tells the host Dr. Mehmet Oz.
"It eats away at you. It drains your physical energy."
Kate and ex-husband Jon Gosselin first made headlines when they launched their former reality series Jon and Kate Plus 8 in 2007. The reality show documented the ups and downs of their hectic lives with eight children, but the family made news headlines more often after they decided to divorce in 2009. The divorce, which didn't seem to take an amicable turn, became a dramatic focal point once Jon began to claim he hadn't seen some of his children. But Kate tells Dr. Oz she's tired of straightening out fact vs. fiction.
"It's probably the most difficult part because I could sit here and do every talk show and every news show every day for the rest of my life and what's so upsetting is that there's still going to be a percentage of people that still can't tell the true me from the tabloid picture they've created," Kate, 41, continues. "And that angers me and that angers me even more when it affects my children and it talks about them."
The Kate Plus 8 star tries to help her children deal with the noise and fodder surrounding their lives but claims their father often makes it more difficult.
"I mess up, yet it's out of love for my kids that I say, 'whooo, I messed up.' I need to get better at that. I mean, my life is my kids and there just wouldn't be Kate Gosselin if it wasn't for my kids. Everything I do for them," she says. "I mean, being on TV is not easy. Having tabloids written about you constantly is not easy."
She adds, "Having an ex-husband who doesn't see the value in uplifting his children and his family, whether he chooses to be on the show or not, is extremely difficult. But I can't change those things. All I can change is me and my response and what I teach my children about it."