Gypsy Rose Blanchard has revealed the one devastating thing she wishes she could tell her younger self to change the course of her life.
The 32-year-old was released from prison on December 28 for her involvement in her mother, Clauddine ‘Dee Dee’ Blanchard, in collusion with her then-boyfriend Nick Godejohn. Dee Dee had inflicted emotional, physical and medical abuse on her daughter throughout her childhood, leading her to take the most extreme of actions.
Blanchard spent nearly eight years behind bars before being released on parole, after prosecutors cut her a 10-year deal which accounted for the abuse she had suffered throughout her childhood. For years, she was forced by Dee Dee to pretend she suffered from serious illnesses, such as leukaemia and muscular dystrophy.
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She was made to sit in a wheelchair, use a feeding tube and shave her head as if she were undergoing chemotherapy - but none of this was necessary. Blanchard was the victim of Munchausen’s syndrome by proxy, in which a parent or carer falsely claims their dependant is severely ill with the aim of gaining attention or sympathy.
Baby boy has spent his life in hospital as doctors are 'scared' to discharge himNow Blanchard has been released, she has been speaking to the media about her feelings towards her mother and how she thinks about her past life. Speaking to the Associated Press, she revealed the one heartbreaking thing she wishes she could tell her younger self, to avoid taking the violent route she chose to end the abuse.
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“I wish I could go back and tell my younger self, ‘Call your dad. Reach out for help with people because they will actually believe you,’” she said. “The main reason why I didn’t is because I really felt like nobody would believe me whenever I said that things just wasn’t right at home.”
It wasn’t easy for Blanchard to speak to others as Dee Dee permitted only limited relationships with others and successfully duped doctors into believing she was ill. Blanchard claims her mother didn’t even allow her to have a proper relationship with her father, who she is now getting to know better following her release, along with her new husband Ryan Anderson who she married in June 2022, while still in prison.
Despite the torment she went through during her childhood, Blanchard says she “forgives” her mother, and previously said she “didn’t deserve what happened”. Speaking to AP on Tuesday, she said: “At first I was really angry with her, very confused. And I’m still confused. But I understand that she had a lot of mental issues.
“And so I think that’s brought me to a place of forgiveness by just trying to understand where she was coming from,” she continued. “I don’t believe that she was evil. I know that she was very sick.”
But now Gypsy Rose Blanchard is enjoying life on the outside and getting to know her family in more depth as she enjoys her first taste of real freedom in her whole life. “I was in a little cocoon. And now that I’m free, I’ve emerged as a butterfly,” she said. She reportedly now wishes to go into public speaking to raise awareness on Munchausen’s syndrome by proxy and child abuse.