The Buzz on Blanchard
Unexpected posts and comments regarding her private life with her husband by the recently released convict Gypsy-Rose Blanchard have received praise from the mass media. Hailed as an icon living her best life, it seems the public has forgotten – or even willfully ignored – why Blachard went to prison in the first place. Although not directly responsible, Blanchard coerced her ex-boyfriend Nicholas Godejohn to murder the woman who had kept her caged and isolated: her mother. Blanchard was deemed a victim of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, a mental illness in which a caretaker makes up fake symptoms or causes real symptoms to occur in their child to give them an appearance of illness. The typical motivations of this illness are to draw out sympathy from other people, as well as physical gifts. In fact, Blanchard and her mother were treated to a house built by Habitat for Humanity, a free Disney World Trip from the Make-A-Wish Foundation and meetings with celebrities like Miranda Lambert.
Since her eventful return to the public domain, she has rapidly gained followers on social media and has been invited to various talk shows and interviews. Praised for her mature demeanor throughout these interviews, Blanchard even admitted that her mother was extremely sick throughout her life and that she missed her. Within these discussions, Blanchard separates herself from Godejohn and pushes relatively all the blame onto him. When asked in her first postrelease interview if she thinks it is fair that Godejohn is serving a life sentence while she is free after just eight years, Blanchard evaded the questions and claimed, “I am sure we both have a lot of regrets. All I can really say is that I did my time. He is doing his time for his part. And I wish him well on his journey.” What she neglected to mention is that she was the intellectually competent one in the situation; Blanchard was revealed to have no actual health or mental disabilities once examined in prison, while Godejohn had been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder, Dissociative Identity Disorder and has a remarkably low IQ. That is not to say Godejohn did not know what he was doing, he actually says he would do it again– differently, but again– which proves just how easily he was convinced to do someone’s bidding. Blanchard took advantage of Godejohn and his hopeless love for her and became a master of the one thing she had learned from her mother: manipulation. During her time in prison, Blanchard declined therapy and other forms of help. In light of this, it is apparent that she is nowhere near healed enough to be having such a massive platform straight out of jail. The media and consumers are completely disregarding and overlooking the years of trauma she suffered under her mother and the in-depth professional help that she should be receiving. Blanchard has never truly had the chance to grow into her own personality, identity and person. She has been caged in her home, imprisoned in jail and now transitioning to being married before she even gets to experience a normal, single life without the overbearing abuse of her mother. It is painfully apparent that Blanchard never had the freedom and time away from the hoards of flashing lights to truly enjoy being herself and find who she is, what her passions are and the small things in life. Whether it is a publicity team, her husband or even herself that is pushing Blanchard into the spotlight for the money and 15 minutes of fame, she needs therapy, professional help and some semblance of an experience akin to being a normal person. The public is allowing Blanchard to steer the narrative instead of analyzing the situation for themselves. While it is important to acknowledge how the traumatic life she was born into affected how she is wired to act, think and feel— which cannot be helped— it is equally as important to recognize that although she may not have held the knife, she did kill the mother she claims to love and miss. Social media and the general public need to stop glorifying, idolizing and making a role model out of a person responsible for second-degree murder.
