Kate Gosselin’s Former Nanny Speaks out About Child Abuse Claims Made By the Former TLC Star’s Son

As Kate Gosselin continues to deny allegations her estranged son Collin made about her, the former TLC star’s nanny is speaking out about what she saw at the residence.

In his new memoir, In the Shadow of Eight: Surviving the Reality of My Childhood, Collin claimed his mother placed him in a “small holding cell” that she had placed in the family’s home for two years before he was moved to a mental institution.

Kate slammed her son’s claims, referring to them as “terrible lies” and pointing out that it “should be illegal to defame someone” in a memoir.

In an interview with PEOPLE, the former nanny, Ashley, spoke about what she saw during her six-month employment with the Gosselin family.

“I used to watch the show, like, ‘My gosh, this is actually real. You can have infertility issues, and you can still have kids,’” Ashley explained.

Ashley said she applied for a nanny job but didn’t find out it was the Gosselin family until her interview.

“She didn’t say who she was [in the post], just that the nanny could live on the estate, and you could tell she was very, very wealthy,” the former nanny recalled. “So, I met her at Starbucks, and she showed up in her sports car.”

Ashley pointed out that, because of her college schedule, she could only be a house cleaner and fill-in nanny. At the residence, she realized that things were very different from what she saw on the TV show.

“She very much outwardly treated Collin different,” Ashley said about Kate. “She 110 percent abused Collin. It’s hard to almost put into words the specific hate that she had towards Collin. You could just feel it. I saw her grab Collin many, many times.”

Ashley then spoke about the “house manual” Kate had for the home, which detailed all the rules for staff. The rules included not taking photos of the kids and keeping the family dog out of the house, except in the basement.

“The house was to look unlived-in at all times,” Ashley pointed out. “She would have weekly chores, biweekly chores, and they would include having a toothpick and going through the edges in the fridge.”

Ashley also said Kate wouldn’t let the children do anything. “There were never toys out. There was never things out. They couldn’t live.”

The former nanny also noted that the children were allowed only one or two school outfits per week because of the high volume of laundry. She pointed out Kate’s interactions with the children felt “robotic.”

“It was not loving,” Ashley said. “She very much made it known who was a favorite, who wasn’t, who’s annoying. Someone would come and pick the dog up for grooming, but she treated her kids basically worse than animals.”

Ashley then recalled one situation that has stood out to her, even years after her employment. One day, she discovered a big, red plastic spoon in a drawer of school supplies, which surprised her because “everything in the house was always so meticulous.”

When asked about the spoon, Ashley stated she was “pretty sure” that Alexis said, “Oh, that’s the spoon mommy uses when she gets mad.”

Ashley said the incident led her to quit the job after only six months.

“I was like, “Oh, okay. I can’t work here anymore. This really is as bad as I think it is,’” she recalled. “That red spoon has haunted me for a long time.”

Before leaving the job, Ashley said she called Children and Youth Services for Berks County on Kate. Collin shared that a child services investigation was triggered when he appeared at school in pain. He claimed Kate had yanked his ear that morning.

Ashley said that Kate’s behavior towards Collin was always disturbing. “She’d rip him right out of his chair in the kitchen.”

Regarding why she called child services on Kate, Ashley said, “I ended up getting sick because I started taking it home with me, because I didn’t have my own kids and I didn’t understand how somebody could be so nasty, downright evil and nasty to their own kids.”

“I know for a fact that I was not the only one who did that,” she added. “I want to use this opportunity to not only back Collin that his mom was psychologically abusive to him, not to mention the physical.”