December 28, 2023

"Nobody will ever hear me say I’m glad she’s dead or I’m proud of what I did. I regret it every single day."

"She didn’t deserve that. She was a sick woman and unfortunately I wasn’t educated enough to see that. She deserved to be where I am, sitting in prison doing time for criminal behavior."

Said Gypsy Rose Blanchard, quoted in "Gypsy Rose Blanchard released from prison early after serving time for the murder of her abusive mother/Blanchard, 32, was released from the Chillicothe Correctional Center at 3:30 a.m. Thursday. She had been serving a 10-year sentence for the June 2015 slaying of her mother" (NBC News).
Blanchard, 32... was granted parole and released three years before her original release date, a spokesperson said.... In court, prosecutors claimed that Blanchard's mother had Munchausen syndrome by proxy.... Blanchard testified that her mother took her to doctors all her life for various conditions, including leukemia and muscular dystrophy, and forced her to use a wheelchair and an oxygen tank that she didn't actually need.... 

21 comments:

Lawlizard said...

Only a matter of time til this happens to the mothers pushing their children into transgender hormones and surgeries.

Mike Sylwester said...

testified that her mother took her to doctors all her life for various conditions, including leukemia and muscular dystrophy, and forced her to use a wheelchair and an oxygen tank that she didn't actually need

I think you repeated that sentence unintentionally.

The Crack Emcee said...

"She didn’t deserve that,” Blanchard added. “She was a sick woman and unfortunately I wasn’t educated enough to see that. She deserved to be where I am, sitting in prison doing time for criminal behavior."

No, "a sick woman" should've been in a medical facility. But we don't seem to do that anymore. Which is why we have so many self-proclaimed "healers" wandering the landscape.

We're a sick society in that way.

FullMoon said...

The doctors accepted moms' diagnosis?

Reminds me when a doctor diagnosed vomiting and pain in a teen aged girl as bulimia when, in fact, it was kidney stones.

Many doctors are not as competent as we have been led to believe.

Ice Nine said...

She is lucky that Mom was doing Münchhausen twenty years ago and that she only got her head shaved and a feeding tube stuck down her nose. If it were today, Dee Dee would have have seen to it that Gypsy had her boobs cut off and had her vaj sewed up and turned into a faux dick.

Rich said...

How did that description of "Munchausen's by proxy" get approved? It's factually incorrect. Parents don't imagine their children to have illnesses, they *pretend* they do. They deliberately harm or lie about their children and place themselves in a rescuer or victim role to get attention. This story is sad all around, but ultimately this poor girl was abused beyond imagination. Wishing her the best going forward.

Howard said...

Some people need to be put down like a rabid dog.

Big Mike said...

Had I been on that jury I’d have voted to acquit. And I would not have budged.

Yancey Ward said...

Howard, I just phoned your local animal control- they will be with you shortly.

jim said...

Oh, so that's what goes on in Missouri. I always wondered.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Sounds a bit like "Beau is Afraid".
Weird stories for weird times.
Must be the season of the witch.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

What about the mothers that put their child on puberty blockers?

Isn’t that some kind of abuse?

Tom McGlynn said...

Reading the story it appears that the boyfriend who actually did the killing was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. Without knowing more of the story it's hard to evaluate the fairness of that relative to the seven years she has served. But since this has been a widely publicized story perhaps someone could comment.

Joe Smith said...

On the plus side, she could have skipped those horrible Disneyland lines...

MikeD said...

Reading the NBC take one would think she was a willing participant in her mother's depravity. Following is a long exposition of what a "mother" did to her daughter!

Gypsy Rose was born on July 29, 1991, and soon after, her mother convinced everyone around them that she was suffering from numerous illnesses. Shortly after her birth, while Gypsy Rose was still just a baby, Dee Dee claimed she had sleep apnea and had to sleep with a breathing machine as a result. As she grew older, throughout her childhood, Dee Dee claimed that Gypsy suffered from illnesses like muscular dystrophy and leukemia. Dee Dee would even shave Gypsy Rose's head to maintain the illusion that she was receiving chemotherapy. Dee Dee forced Gypsy Rose to take unnecessary medications and made her use a wheelchair, despite Gypsy being able to walk. Gypsy was also forced into a feeding tube that she did not need.
The litany of illnesses Dee Dee claimed Gypsy had included seizures, asthma, cerebral palsy, cognitive disabilities, paralysis, and hearing and visual impairments. She underwent so many surgical procedures, one of which was the removal of her salivary glands. When her teeth started to rot, her mother had a dentist pull them all. However, because Dee Dee, by all outward appearances, came off as a loving and doting mother, people believed her. Dee Dee also claimed to have been a victim of Hurricane Katrina, which allowed her to have a plausible story to cover for missing medical records. When family members became suspicious, Dee Dee would just move. Doctors who questioned claims of Gypsy's ailments caused Dee Dee to find different doctors. Habitat for Humanity even built them a home in Springfield, MO in 2008.
Dee Dee even falsified Gypsy's birth certificate to present her as younger than she actually was. She also managed to get a judge to deem Gypsy mentally incompetent to handle her own care. At least one doctor, Dr. Bernardo Flasterstein, a neurologist in Missouri, had suspicions because no abnormalities showed up in Gypsy's blood tests and MRI scans, but he had stated that he had no firm evidence of abuse to bring to authorities.

Fast forward to 2011 when Gypsy makes her first attempt to escape her mother. She ran away with a man she had met at a sci-fi convention, but her mother managed to track her down and convince the man that Gypsy was a minor, although she was actually 19-years-old at the time. Dee Dee subsequently physically tied Gypsy to her bed at home and smashed her computer. Other punishments included withholding food.

Gypsy managed to get back online without her mother's knowledge and joined a Christian dating site, where she met Nicholas Godejohn. The rest, as they say, is history. Nicholas had a long and concerning history of mental illness himself, and a record that included indecent exposure. In a 2017 interview with Dr. Phil, Gypsy said Godejohn 'had multiple personalities that were violent and scary. He thought he was a 500-year-old vampire named Victor.'
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BitterClinger said...

Yes, it appears the boyfriend got life without parole while she's out in seven years. Seems he's getting a serving of male privilege good and hard. Adding insult to injury, she married someone else.

Quaestor said...

How is it that a 23-year-old woman found it necessary to kill her mother over being treated for diseases she didn't have? At 23 a female is a fully-fledged woman endowed and empowered with independence and mighty strength. (Just try arguing against that fashionable dogma. Joy Behar will try to poke your eyes out with a spike-heeled pump.)

Something very fishy has been going on here.

walter said...

Blogger Lem the artificially intelligent said...
What about the mothers that put their child on puberty blockers?
Isn’t that some kind of abuse?
--
Parents who gave their kids experimental jabs...

tim in vermont said...

Gypsy Rose Lee's mother was pretty abusive towards her child too, if you believe the movie.

Freeman Hunt said...

"Had I been on that jury I’d have voted to acquit. And I would not have budged."

Same.

Joe Bar said...

JFC. What a disaster. American justice at it's finest. The poor kid in jail for the rest of his life. WTF is wrong with us?