The Gypsy Rose Obsession
what Gypsy Rose Blanchard's medical records really show

What the Medical Records Show

The records Fancy Macelli released are a few hundred pages out of thousands, and PRETEND has none from Louisiana, where Gypsy spent her early childhood. Even so, they show Dee Dee’s explanations for the wheelchair shifting from one visit to the next. In one record Gypsy is paraplegic from birth. In another she has muscular dystrophy, and in another the paralysis followed a fever. When Dee Dee couldn’t answer a question, she said her own memory was damaged in a car accident and the Louisiana records were lost in Hurricane Katrina.

The leukemia claim appears in the files more than once, and every time it traces back to Dee Dee. The released files contain no oncology records, no chemotherapy, and no bone marrow transplant records. One chart even lists an “anaphylactic reaction to processed sugars,” a condition that doesn’t exist and made it into her file because Dee Dee said so.

The records also document procedures that were real. Gypsy had four eye surgeries, a feeding tube, a stomach surgery for reflux, and her salivary glands removed because Dee Dee said she drooled. By her teens, her teeth had rotted and been pulled.

The Microdeletion

Gypsy’s critics have a strong card to play. Her records include a genetic test showing a 1q21.1 microdeletion, which means a tiny piece of chromosome 1 is missing. Gypsy confirmed the diagnosis to PRETEND and sent the results of a follow-up test. Her critics say it explains every illness Dee Dee ever described.

PRETEND sent Gypsy’s 19-page chromosome report to Kira Dineen, a licensed certified genetic counselor and host of DNA Today, and went through Dee Dee’s claims one at a time. Some line up with the deletion, including a smaller head, short stature, eye problems, seizures, and feeding problems. Others don’t. Kira found nothing in the medical literature linking the deletion to paralysis, leukemia, muscular dystrophy, salivary gland problems, or rotting teeth. The two lists overlap, but they are not the same list. Andrea Dunlop, who hosts Nobody Should Believe Me, told PRETEND that a legitimate medical condition doesn’t rule out abuse. Gypsy put it this way: “You could have someone with a condition and it still be a Munchausen by proxy case.” The full breakdown is in Does Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s Genetic Disorder Explain Everything?

Could Gypsy Walk?

She could, and she hid it. In a video to Godejohn that surfaced in Missouri’s case files, Gypsy said she kept her ability to walk from her mother from about age seven until 2011 because she was afraid Dee Dee wouldn’t love her as much. When PRETEND interviewed her, she said Dee Dee always knew. She later described it by email as coercive control, and PRETEND finds that account easier to believe than a child fooling her mother for more than a decade.

The series doesn’t let either side off the hook here. Gypsy’s own words contradict each other, and the records show a 2009 neurologist watching her react to touch on legs Dee Dee called paralyzed.

Was Dee Dee Sick, or a Con Artist?

A growing camp online argues that Dee Dee didn’t have Munchausen by proxy at all. Some say she was a poor single mother working the system, and others say Gypsy was the abuser. Their evidence includes Dee Dee’s internet searches for mother-daughter counseling and group homes in the months before the murder, the BB gun incident Gypsy admits to, and the point, made by the Into the Weeds hosts, that Gypsy’s messages to Godejohn never describe physical abuse.

On the other side are the Habitat for Humanity house, the Make-A-Wish trips, a Ronald McDonald House stay, and a typed list of 15 conditions in a 2007 hospital file. That list includes leukemia, epilepsy, and quadriplegia, many of the words are misspelled, and it doesn’t look like any hospital document PRETEND has seen. PRETEND’s view is that a money scam and Munchausen by proxy are not mutually exclusive. Shaving your child’s head for years when she doesn’t have cancer is not only about money.

The Prison Calls

In August 2026, the Missouri Department of Corrections released about seven years of Gypsy’s recorded calls from Chillicothe Correctional Center to a requester who signed the request “Not your business.” Prison calls are generally not public records, and the department declined to explain how it decides which calls to release.

The calls show the business of being Gypsy taking shape while she was still inside. Her stepmother, Kristy, suggests signing Gypsy’s story rights over to the family, because, as she puts it, “we all know that you can’t get paid for it because you were involved.” On one call Gypsy says she’s going to be rich when she gets out, and on another she says she didn’t have her mother killed just so she could live for everybody else. In calls with Ryan Anderson, the man she married in prison, both of them use racist language. Gypsy has apologized publicly, though she told PRETEND privately that she doesn’t think she was ever racist. A call with Kristy before Godejohn’s trial, in which Gypsy says she “put a lot of focus on Munchausen by proxy” in her interviews, has been passed around as a confession. PRETEND’s read is that playing something up is not the same thing as making it up.

Gypsy as a Mother

Gypsy’s daughter, Aurora, was born in December 2024, and PRETEND has called Gypsy the most surveilled mother in America. People have called child protective services over Gypsy’s social media videos. One report was combined with an earlier one, and the case was closed as not justified. Per a screenshot reviewed by PRETEND, someone pulled Aurora’s immunization record from Louisiana’s state database on July 30, 2025, and it was shown on a TikTok live stream. The federal Office for Civil Rights has opened an investigation into the Louisiana Department of Health. PRETEND does not know who accessed the record and has requested the access log.

Ken Urker

Ken Urker, Gypsy’s former partner and Aurora’s father, was found dead at his home in Raceland, Louisiana, on October 1, 2026, his 34th birthday. The death investigation is open and no official cause of death has been released. Gypsy told PRETEND that months of online harassment had worn him down. PRETEND’s full report, including the sheriff’s office report, is in Gypsy Rose on Ken Urker’s Death.

Latest Reporting

October 9, 2026

Does Gypsy Rose Blanchard's Genetic Disorder Explain Everything?

Gypsy Rose Blanchard has a 1q21.1 microdeletion. A genetic counselor explains which of Dee Dee Blanchard's claims it could explain, and which it can't.

October 2, 2026

Gypsy Rose on Ken Urker's Death: "They Killed Him"

Ken Urker, Gypsy Rose Blanchard's partner and father of their daughter, died Oct. 1, 2026, in Raceland, Louisiana. Here's what we know and what Gypsy told me.