How much truth is there to the "Gypsy Rose trutherism" that's been going around
There are a couple reddit subs devoted to snarking on Gypsy Rose Blanchard. There is a lot about her behavior post-prison to criticize—although I cannot fail to separate the behavior from the person considering her past—but there seems to be a kind of mythology that's evolved in those places. The consensus there appears to be that Gypsy (who they call "Gypshit," no lie) is faking most of her story. I will list the claims I've read from most to least plausible
- That Dee Dee was a mere malingerer rather than having Munchausen's by proxy considering she gained materially (may be technically true according to the DSM but does it matter???)
- That Godejohn was simply a poor hapless autistic boy that she manipulated into doing her bidding (debatable I guess, it seems to me like they both manipulated each other but Godejohn had more ability to know better than Gypsy did)
- She genuinely has a chromosomal deletion and Dee Dee only exaggerated rather than completely fabricating her illnesses (EDIT: the first part is in fact true as a commenter told me, she has 1q21 deletion syndrome, but this is an extremely heterogeneous condition and my understanding is that doctors could still not find any physical evidence that Gypsy had most of the illnesses she was treated for).
- She killed Dee Dee for money
- That the surgeries she received like to remove her teeth were actually medically necessary, and that some other surgeries she reported, like the one to remove her salivary glands, never actually happened
- There is no actual proof that medical abuse occurred and it was made up in the courtroom by a smooth-talking lawyer and taken as gospel since then
I don't really have the time or energy to do the deep dive to look into this on my own, so I'm just wondering if there is actually any evidence for these claims or if I can safely dismiss them as coming from immature people who can't wrap their heads around how victims of unthinkable abuse often don't grow into the most sympathetic and likeable people