Gypsy Rose Blanchard is set to be released on December 28th, 2023 after only serving 85 percent of her 10-year sentence. Gypsy Rose Blanchard was initially convicted in June of 2015 alongside her online boyfriend Nick Godejohn of murdering Claudine Blanchard. The 2015 murder of Claudine, or “Dee Dee,” captured headlines and led to the creation of numerous documentaries because of the brutality and history behind the murder.
Claudine was Gypsy’s mother and fictionalized film adaptations such as The Act and Mommy Dead Dearest allowed the public to learn about Claudine’s Munchhausen syndrome by proxy. Munchhausen syndrome is a rare mental disorder in which a person fakes an illness. Claudine began pretending that Gypsy had different illnesses as early as her infancy. A few months after Gypsy Rose was born in 1991, her mother claimed that she had sleep apnea and this was just the beginning of the list of medical problems that Claudine related to her daughter. Claudine began to describe Gypsy as someone who suffered from leukemia, muscular dystrophy, seizures, hearing, and visual impairments, and asthma. Due to Claudine’s false descriptions, Gypsy was prescribed an excessive amount of medication, used a breathing machine, and underwent multiple surgeries. Her salivary glands were removed, and she required a wheelchair and feeding tube.
The truth was that Gypsy didn’t need any of these things and Claudine’s fabrication of Gypsy’s illnesses caused her to gain sympathy and charity, for taking care of an ill child. As Gypsy grew older, it became harder for her mother to control her. Gypsy joined a Christian dating site, which is where she met Nick Godejohn. Gypsy confessed all of her mother’s actions to Nick. Despite them knowing each other for only a brief amount of time, Nick ended up stabbing Claudine seventeen times hoping that it would allow him and Gypsy to be independent together. Nick’s story ends here because he was sentenced to life in prison without parole in 2019.
Credit: Investigation Discovery
For Gypsy, the pain continued because even after her mother’s murder, Claudine gained sympathy. Nobody could understand why Gypsy would turn on her seemingly loving mother. After nearly two decades of abuse Gypsy finally began to share her side of the story. During an exclusive interview with ABC News “20/20”, Gypsy said, “It was not because I hated her. It was because I wanted to escape her.” When the true nature of their relationship was revealed to the world, it became nearly impossible to avoid hearing her name. Gypsy has gained the support of many strangers. The petition to ‘Free Gypsy Rose Blanchard ’ has surpassed over 150,000 signatures. Now that her release date is approaching, people who were in support of her release have expressed their excitement, but also concern.
Credit: ABC News
Gypsy has never been to school and has spent nearly all of her developmental years incarcerated. Plus, her life circumstances haven’t given her the best social track record. In an interview with Touch, Fancy Marcelli, a close family friend, reported that Gypsy continued to talk to several men when she was behind bars. Marcelli even went as far as saying, “‘I’m afraid she’ll meet someone and marry him.’” Gypsy’s only human and more than anything, she craves genuine human interactions. The publication of her trauma along with the fact that her first real relationship resulted in murder makes this hard for her. At 32 years old, she’ll be entering the real world on her own for the very first time. For many, life after incarceration is just another prison. For the formerly incarcerated, regaining respect and stability in society is hard, and the attention that Gypsy has received only makes matters worse.
Lifetime has already given the green light for the documentary titled “The Prison Confessions Of Gypsy Rose Blanchard” which is set to release in 2024. I think this documentary will be the first in a series of Gypy’s public confessionals. Since she’s already gained national attention, it will not be hard for her to recapture it. People are probably expecting Gypsy’s story to resemble the story of all the other adults robbed of a childhood, but maybe Gypsy can turn her life around. Right?
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