Crime
Daughter Finds Out Her Mother Poisons Her To Keep Her in Her Wheelchair
The story of Gypsy Rose Blanchard and her mother
A loving mother is how people would describe Dee Dee, but inside her home is a deep secret only she and her daughter knew. Gypsy Rose wasn't sick. Everything was all a lie.
On June 14, 2015, it was all over Dee Dee's Facebook page that had her friends worried it says;
“That B — — is dead.”
Soon after, her body was discovered which led to the arrest of her killers, and what surprised many was that the one behind her murder was her own daughter, Gypsy Rose.
But how can a sick child who had been taken care of by Dee Dee all her life think about killing her mother?
It turned out Gypsy Rose wasn't sick. Instead, everyone believed Dee Dee that her daughter was suffering from various medical conditions. Dee Dee claimed she had chronic conditions including leukemia, asthma, and muscular dystrophy and had the "mental capacity of a 4-year-old due to brain damage.
Gypsy Rose was, in fact, a victim of her mother's mental illness. Doctors call it the Munchausen syndrome by proxy, which means the caregiver, usually the mother of a child, believes that her child is sick with different illnesses.
Certain characteristics are common in a person with MSP, including:
Is a parent or caregiver, usually a mother
May be a health care professional
Is very friendly and cooperative with the health care providers
Appears quite concerned (some may seem overly concerned) about their child
May suffer from Munchausen syndrome (a related disorder in which a person repeatedly acts as if they have a physical or mental illness when they are not really sick)
Murder of Dee Dee Blanchard
Dee Dee was born Clauddine Pitre. At 24, she married Rod Blanchard, who was 17 at the time. She gave birth to a daughter they named Gypsy Rose, the couple separated soon after.
Rod continued to be a part of Gypsy Rose's life, but he too would believe Dee Dee's lies about their daughter. By the time she was 7, everyone had thought that Gypsy needed to be in a wheelchair.
Friends and society saw Dee Dee as the ideal mother who did everything for her sick child. In return, Dee Dee and Gypsy received financial and moral support from strangers and their community.
Gypsy Rose won awards for being 'special.' Habitat for Humanity even built them a house in 2008.
In 2011, Gypsy Rose met a man in one of the science conventions that she and her mom had attended since 2001.
But Dee Dee found out about it and threatened the man that he could get into a lot of trouble for being with an underage woman, when in fact, by this time, Gypsy Rose was already 19 years old.
In 2012, Gypsy Rose met another man on a Christian dating site, his name is Nicholas Godejohn, who reports said he also had some form of mental illness.
In 2015, Gypsy Rose convinced Nicholas to do the unthinkable to be together. She asked Nicholas to kill her mother.
Soon after, Gypsy Rose was arrested together with Nicholas Godejohn. While both received jail time, Gypsy Rose is eligible for parole in 2024, and Nicholas Godejohn is serving life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. There is a Change.org petition to reduce the prison sentence of Nicholas.
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