Gypsy Rose Blanchard needs support, says expert representing Munchausen

• Gypsy Rose Blanchard became internet famous after being released from prison.
• An expert on Munchausen’s vicarious victims said it was not Blanchard’s fault for taking advantage of the attention.
• But the internet may not be the best place for Blanchard to continue her recovery.

Gypsy Rose Blanchard is a star.

Blanchard was released from prison on Dec. 28 after serving eight years for second-degree murder in the 2015 killing of her mother, Claudine “Dee Dee” Blanchard. His posts on Instagram and TikTok have garnered tens of millions of likes.

From the moment she got out of prison, paparazzi followed her and fans followed her every move. she is wearinghow is she? spend time with familyand what she is revealing About when I was in prison.

And when she’s not on social media, she’s walking red carpets, doing the media rounds, sharing awkward moments with Joy Behar on “The View,” and watching her on “Entertainment Tonight.” They even defend the new boos. In these interviews, the reaction that people always get is that they can’t get enough of her.

Most of her mentions are full of support, with people praising her as a war survivor. Munchausen by proxy — but it’s also full of memes making fun of her. negativityand conspiracy theories.

This is normal for a public figure, but Blanchard is not your typical star. Munchausen by Surrogate Survivor often deals with post-traumatic stress disorder and acute stress reactions. Her position as a survivor raises the following questions: As someone who is very likely still recovering from what her mother went through, is the internet the best place for Blanchard?

Mark Feldman, psychiatrist, author, and acting Munchausen expert He prefers to call it medical child abuse, but what does Gypsy think about when going from prisoner to public figure, and what helps her as a recovering abuse victim? He spoke to Business Insider about the issue.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

You’ve been following Blanchard’s story for a while. Did you anticipate social media’s reaction to her release?

I never expected her to receive, and still receive, so much attention on social media. I may be a bit of an amateur when it comes to social media in general, but I thought it would get some attention but not be this overwhelming. She seems happy with most of it and isn’t doing anything to suppress it. But at this point, I can’t blame her for meeting her insatiable demands for information on Gypsy Rose.

And Blanchard appears to have a financial stake as well.

she got nothing Hulu series “The Act”. She couldn’t even talk to anyone. She didn’t know it was legal at first, but then she was convinced it was. It’s a shame that she didn’t receive any compensation for the work that so well represents her life.

In addition to being a money-making opportunity for Blanchard, there also appears to be a growing awareness, especially among Gen Z, that what Blanchard experienced was abuse. Do you think that’s a positive thing?

It is mostly positive, but it must be borne in mind that Gypsy herself admits that arranging the murder of her mother was a mistake. There were other ways to draw attention to her true physical and cognitive state, but that would have been extremely difficult. I think she had limited options, but we have to consider the extent of the manipulation she did regarding her mother’s murder.

I see Nicholas Godejohn In a sense, as her victim. I think a life sentence without the possibility of parole is extremely excessive. Given that he is autistic, he should have at least been given a chance at parole, but there was some debate over how autistic he was, so it was not brought up at the criminal hearing. Ta. But Gypsy Rose had the presence to buy the knife and give it to him and tell him what she wanted him to do. At the very least, he’s highly suggestible, so we can’t paint her as all the victim, and we can’t paint her all the perpetrator. She is a complex character, which is why this story will be covered in the media for some time and a book will be published – apart from one written by Gypsy herself with the help of two others.

It’s interesting that you bring up manipulation. Because I was going to ask about it in the context of her social media presence. In her previous interviews, she talked about how much she appeared in the media. At the time you assumed that at least some of her interviews must have been manipulations. Do you still believe it?

I think it’s part of her manipulation, but it’s also very appealing when there’s an opportunity to make money or get attention. She was raised by her mother, a world expert at manipulating attention and control, and was isolated from others who would probably exhibit healthier behaviors. So I’m not surprised that things played out the way they did. worry. I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing psychologically, as long as it doesn’t last too long.

What is she trying to manipulate people into thinking and doing?

I think Gypsies’ efforts to become financially secure and restore their reputations are driven by others. She’s always been the subject of intense interest, and she and her entourage know it. My comments on this point exclude her family, who seem to have a genuine interest in her well-being. She has little education and no obvious job skills. I don’t blame her for wanting money for her story, which I’m sure will happen eventually, but I hope she won’t be surprised or upset if her interest wanes. I was a little surprised by one of her TikTok posts. In that post, she carefully lists the titles of her e-books and her life documentary. It certainly seems like she has a publicist, even if she doesn’t have a personal one. That’s not necessarily a bad thing in the moment, but I hope she understands that it doesn’t necessarily have her best interests at heart in the short or long term.

Blanchard probably has some sort of trauma from her childhood. Is the internet a good place for Gypsy, where her every move is being watched?

Perhaps there is a lot of pressure to embrace every media opportunity and stay highly involved with social media because not only does she need to make money, but there are people around who are trying to make money from her. I think it will take her.I saw a post about how weird it was that her husband looked like her mother. They’re both overweight – otherwise I wouldn’t have seen it. A large number of comments were posted in support of this. The anonymity of the Internet can change how people feel about a situation. So whenever someone posts something disrespectful or hostile, there are always people who jump on it, intentionally or not, and start a series of posts about it.

It might make sense for someone neutral to review these posts. As far as I know, her family seems to be loving, supportive, and protective. So I want her to focus on her people with no other purpose than to help her heal herself and move on.

What is best psychologically for Gypsies who are recovering from this type of abuse?

No one seems to be really asking the question of what’s best for Gypsies psychologically, but I wish more people would do so.

I don’t know if you are aware of the Maya Kowalski case in Florida. But my first reaction when Gypsy’s name started popping up online was, let’s be honest, how articles about Gypsy came to completely pre-empt the Kowalski incident and the falsehoods about medical child abuse. It was a wonderful thing. Because for a while, all everyone wanted to talk about was how false accusations of child medical abuse were happening all over the place, and that wasn’t true. Now, with Gypsy Rose’s increased profile, who can honestly say this was a misdiagnosis? So I hope she remains as public as she has been, perhaps for selfish reasons as well as her professional ones.

But it needs to end and it will be difficult for her to find treatment from someone truly knowledgeable. There still tends to be little training on Munchausen by proxy. Despite her psychiatry training, I had never heard of it until she joined the faculty at Duke University. But she hopes she can find support.

A support group exists for survivors through the website munchausensupport.com. I would like to see that resource be made available to Gypsies, as long as her too-extreme story does not dominate and other survivors’ voices are heard. That would be a big risk.

Will Gypsy Rose’s story drown out other abuse victims?

She draws attention to Munchausen by proxy more than anyone else, but most of the cases, in fact all the other cases that I know of, do not involve the murder of the mother. Her affair continued throughout her childhood and adolescence. That’s rare. Most cases simply involve the perpetrator, most often the child’s mother, falsely reporting or exaggerating the child’s symptoms to the doctor. And it may or may not be obvious right away.

There is no need to focus on the fact that nearly all, if not all, of Munchausen’s other representative cases are mild and subtle. But the doctor recognized them and said, “Well, this is no different from the Gypsy Rose case. So there’s no possibility of Munchausen by proxy. It’s better not to report it to the police or child protection services.” You need to stop thinking like that. That’s a big deal.

I testified in a case where a guardian’s attorney obtained information about Munchausen on his behalf after watching “The Act.” I testified that it would seriously mislead her unless she found other, more nuanced sources of information. I was worried that she would downplay the incident. Because it wasn’t that extreme.

I would also like to point out that if there is murder or murder, it is by children. Munchausen’s published accounts of the agency lawsuit allege that six children were killed as a result of mothers injecting or suffocating their children with germs, or at the hands of doctors who unwittingly performed potentially dangerous surgeries. ~9% die. .