To know anyone irl with munchausens?

[Lw87]

Watching the gypsy rose doc, I'd never heard of munchausens disease before and can't even think I'd know anyone with it in real life

Has anyone actually had an RL encounter with someone with this?

I know someone who has it! A mother and daughter the daughter pretends to be Ill all the time and the mother rewards it. Unfortunately these are people that I still have in my life (as little as possible) so I can’t go into too much detail . The hospital visits are pathetic almost. It’s a sad world and it’s far too late for them.

I think a lot of us have people on social media who seem to post when they are in the hospital, bit attention seeky, those who exaggerate their illness either for sympathy/attention or financial gain, there lots of people out there with health anxiety and also lots of people with symptoms that require them to jump through various hoops before finally getting a diagnosis.
Non of these are Munchausens, they are on the spectrum of normal behaviour's if you speak to any healthcare person. Munchausens is an entirely different kettle of fish. It is like playing a deadly game of chess looking after someone with Munchausen's and actually quite frightening, as any HCA who has had to look after them will tell you

@50ShadesOfCatholic

I guess why I've often wondered is whether people with Munchausens or MBP are aware they are faking it whether they genuinely believe they/their child is ill

From what I have witnessed and this is only my opinion, it is almost like they have got onto a rollercoaster and there is no way of getting off, the situation snowballs, no rational person wants a Munchausens diagnosis on their medical notes and I feel desperately sorry for anyone who has been given this diagnosis. How do you move forward from that ?

My MIL is classic case. Although not officially diagnosed. She started telling people she was dying from various illnesses 20 years ago. At first the family were devastated… until she miraculously survived cancer without treatment or symptoms. Over the years she’s had doctors flat out tell her (in front of relatives she took with her) that there was nothing wrong, and that her issues were definitely not cancer. She replied that they “were wrong” 🙄 every so often she changes the type of cancer she claims to have. Then every once in a while she makes up a completely fictitious disease which is fun! She’s also a scarily compulsive liar in real life day to day things too (on a level where she’ll tell opposing lies to the same person just hours apart) so I think it’s all related. She’s also nasty with it too which is why we are now NC.

@me4real

As some other posters have mentioned, unfortunately accusations of FII are genuinely levelled at the Mother and often on baseless grounds.

@Sunshinebuttercups A friend of mine was hinted at by doctors that she might get labelled as having Munchausen's by Proxy (she was a new mum and also a nurse, and I think nurses can develop some anxieties around illness etc.)

So when her son was next off colour, she didn't go to the hospital immediately as she had been told she was on the verge of being labelled as Munchausen's.

Her son had a fractured leg and she's had her child taken off her and been accused of neglect because she didn't immediately take him to the hosp.

Is there's more to this story......?

My mother was accused of having it when I was little; I was extremely sick with a very hard to recognise and diagnose condition, and she was a nurse so every time I collapsed at home, by the time the ambulance arrived she had always brought me round/cooled me down etc. They thought she was mental and neurotic. Obviously in the end she was proven correct.

My son had the same and because of my history I was taken more seriously but initially my paedatrician was definitely sceptical and it wasn’t a very nice feeling.

This thread is fascinating. The article about Belle Gibson is 😱

I'm on the other side of this. The kid that was actually ill with weird or unrelated symptoms that seemed fine so no one really believed me including my parents. Or if they did they didn't think it was serious.

It started with side/lower back sharp pains that were intermittent and eventually went away. That was put down to attention seeking, hurting myself and not remembering etc.

Then I was complaining of being breathless, feeling faint, having to sit down just when going for a walk. This was put down to me being overweight /unfit and since I still wanted to go out and play must be fine.

Then I started looking kinda unwell so I saw a couple of paediatricians. They listened to my chest, claimed it was viral and it'll go away. I didn't have any cold symptoms besides still breathing kinda funny.

Then the high fevers started 40/41 and it was finally agreed that I should have a chest xray after much uhmmming and ahhhing whether it's really necessary and the risks of an unnecessary xray.

Once the xray came back it showed my left lung was 75% filled with fluid (pleurisy I think it's called?) and I was admitted right then and there. By then I was lethargic,stopped eating, refused to leave the bed except going to the toilet. I was on antibiotics, meds (with the next step being the tube draining thingy if no improvement) and a shit load of other meds. I was in hospital for a month, had to had physio to recover lung function, on meds for a very long time after and excused from PE for a whole year(that was a bonus tbh).

All because I was 13 and behaved like it (wanting to go out and be with friends and play)and looked well and was a bit chubby.

The trouble with Munchausens is that it is difficult to diagnose as most Health Professionals are loathe to diagnose until the behaviour is well embedded.

I really think that this needs looking into.
But there are so many cases , and I remember from childhood, of certain children that seemed to always be off sick ( gluten, allergies, IBS etc.. maybe) similarly, there were all the usual suspects that would come into school with fractures etc...

I know someone who appears to have both Munchausens and Proxy.
It's really scary and current safeguarding guidelines seem to not be able to trigger intervention until it's almost /usually too late.

Beggars belief , in fact.

I’ve previously worked in a childcare setting were we had to make numerous child protection referrals against a parent claiming the child was seriously ill however the school nurse told us there was absolutely no record of any illness of any kind

I got falsely accused of it and nearly lost my children. It was harrowing how things were twisted to fit an agenda I had to fight to clear my name

I know someone who I strongly suspect has traits of Munchasusens. Her children are adults now, but she was often taking them to hospital etc. With the children, I have no idea if she was fabricating anything, but with herself, her stories never quite added up.

Hiw donyou know they don't. Family members have similar genes and environmental exposures. It's not uncommon for several family members to be impacted by eds, me cfs, pans pandas, ehlers danlos etc. These Conditions have lots of symptoms.

As someone with a diagnosis of HEDs (diagnosed by a rheumatologist) I wish I hadn't read through this thread.

Oh my goodness.. that is utterly awful.… Hope that you are OK now.

@Lw87

I’m in California & familiar with Gypsy Rose. Her mother took advantage of free trips to Disney, etc., free homes, food, the finest medical care - and fooled everyone.
She even convinced her daughter Gypsy for years that she was very ill.
But I believe at some point, Gypsy figured out that she wasn’t ill and the mom started chaining (tying?) her to her bed and locking her in her room. It was bad.
And then somehow, Gypsy got access to the internet and dating sites - and that’s how she met her accomplice.
I haven’t thought about this case for a long time, but I’m happy to read here that Munchausen By Proxy is now classified as child abuse - because that’s exactly what Gypsy Rose suffered. And no, I don’t think her mother deserved to die for it.
Gypsy doesn’t look anything now like she did when she was that ill little child in the wheelchair.

The chest pains and dizziness sounds like a panic attack

Yes I do. I know a woman whose daughter has the same genetic disease as mine. Both our children spend a lot of time in hospital for IVs & she thrives when her daughter is sick in hospital. She latches on to parents in the hospital whose children are on end of life care, then she brags about how she knew that child & how her daughter would play with them before they died. This has happened well over 5 times with terminally sick children so it’s a pattern. Honestly it’s hard to explain. I get so down & stressed when my son has to go in to hospital, whereas she loves it. Loves that her daughter is the more poorly child out of the two. It sounds weird writing it down like I’m making it up but I’m not. Very sad for the child, she doesn’t deserve her.

That’s not munchausens/FII

Her child has a genuine condition. Not caused by her or faked or exaggerated.

The way a parent copes with genuine illness in a child isn’t an indication of FII. She may be trying to make the best of a bad situation and be positive or she may be putting on a mask and trying to smile through it. Plus if she’s on a ward with terminally ill children the probability is high that she will play with those child who have a high chance of passing away. It’s not like she’s getting access to a ward she shouldn’t be on ?

Maybe I haven’t explained it properly. She basically revels in her daughter being sick. She purposely takes her to A&E so they will take her in to the ward. She has told me this herself & she’s not ashamed to admit it either. If someone else’s child is sick, her child is sicker. A bit like if I’ve been to Tenerife she’s been to elevenrife. The child was made to sit in a pram constantly because her mum made out she couldn’t walk, the doctors went as far as doing a muscle biopsy thinking she genuinely couldn’t walk, turns out she could walk but her mum wanted a mobility car & wanted people’s sympathy. Everyone who knows her knows she latches on to parents of really poorly children & then she will text & say “So and so died, I was so close to that child” so casually & it’s funny you say her daughter probably does play with them. She doesn’t as the genetic disease her daughter has, like my sons means they have to have their own isolation room & cannot leave it. Her child is 100% more poorly because she is keeping her poorly on purpose & the team are aware of this.

Would A+E not assess/test and only admit if there was a clinical need ?

Are you saying she is inducing symptoms or withholding medication to worsen a genuine condition? How are you aware that they team know anything as they shouldn’t be discussing this where anyone else could hear ?

Given academic peer reviewed research (Castori et al) has found that hypermobility syndrome disorder in associated with an increased risk of asthma, allergies, autism, gut issues, bladder issues and a whole host of other things... which are the list of things ffi training articles say to look for.... I imagine there are several.people who have been accused of this and it's not. Met two of them on a course and I've not met that many parents of autistic children who have shared enough to know.

And given that autism often has a genetic link, autistic parents of autistic children are often accused as the way their autism presents is similar to how people are told ffi parents present, quite a few accused cases are going to be bog standard autism and hypermobility.

I’m not about to dive into her life on Mumsnet. I’m aware the team Know as the mum herself has told me. Any attention is good attention to her unfortunately. I simply replied to OPs post. I’m not here to get into some Piers Morgan Debate about it 🙃

But by posting what you did you’ve dived into her life on mumsnet ..

Being a parent of a genuinely ill child and being accused of FII/ munchausens is horrendous. It’s such a rare type of abuse that the odds of being wrongly accused are so much higher than the chance of someone actually having munchausens. It can rip families apart.

I’m a mother of a child with a terminal
disease. I don’t revel in it, I certainly don’t make his life harder to garner sympathy, I don’t purposely take him to A&E & lie to get him on to the wards. So maybe stop twisting my words. Everyone else has voiced their opinion but funnily enough it’s just mine you’ve picked up on. When have I said that all parents have FII? I haven’t have I. You’re just implying I have. Im
speaking on someone I know personally enough to know when it’s genuine & when it’s fake, just like everyone else on this thread. So stop looking for arguments. Just plain odd.