Jon & Kate: Young Parents Who Lost Control

Being famous can be extremely ugly, especially when the gossip media and the paparazzi smell blood. And the blood is thick surrounding Jon and Kate Gosselin recently. After Jon was caught hanging out with another woman on repeated occasions and after allegations of Kate's inappropriate relationship with her bodyguard, their reality show has gone from a cute escape for exhausted parents to tabloid fodder for millions of gossip hounds.

The much-anticipated season premiere of Jon & Kate Plus Eight took on an entirely different tone that any previous episode. The centerpiece of the show was the 5th birthday party of the Gosselins' sextuplets. But the overriding theme of the show was the visible separation and the palpable tension between the young husband and wife. Somewhere between the launch of their reality show nearly five years ago and their current situation, the young parents developed separate visions of what they wanted in life.

Actually, it appears that Kate may know what she wants and she's working hard toward achieving it. Jon may have never known and now he may only know what he "doesn't" want. He doesn't want the fame, the constant media stalking, the tabloid covers - and he may no longer want his wife, since she represents all of those things to him. The irony, of course, is that Jon brought all of the real heat on his family when he was caught with another woman late at night, leaving a local bar. That story exploded into stories of infidelity and more damaging images of Jon and his "friend" spending time together while Kate was away.

But the problems are clearly much deeper than Jon's inability to make adult decisions. Their reality show has now turned into a train wreck and millions of people will be watching to see just how things turn out.