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?

@DisasterPasta

I don’t think muchausen by proxy is classed as a psychological disorder any more, it’s just a form of child abuse.

Classing it as a disorder the abuser has diminishes their responsibility and deflects from the real victim.

AFAIK, it's a disorder in the DSM5.

I don't know if it's exactly the same, but I always remember reading a news article from years and years ago about a specialist facility (in Falkirk, IIRC) where they treated two patients by amputating a leg from each of them. The legs (and the rest of the patients) were perfectly (physically) healthy, but they were so utterly convinced that their healthy legs were diseased/going to kill them/hated them that they were borderline suicidal.

Then again, I suppose it's not necessarily uncommon for people to be obsessively upset by the presence of perfectly normal, healthy body parts in other circumstances.

I also remember them talking on Jeremy Vine's radio show a couple of years ago about 'frequent flyers' who called 999 a lot. I calculated that the person who held the 'record' must have literally called 999 for an ambulance once every three hours of their waking life.

They were legally required to send one each time, so each of those 3-hour periods presumably included the dispatch, trip to hospital, examination and trip back home. Their life must have basically consisted of getting back home from hospital without needing any treatment and then immediately reaching for the phone to start the whole process off again - five or six times every single day.

It's a monumental abuse of resources and phenomenal waste of money, but I simply cannot imagine how terrifying it must be to be that person and to be trapped inside their mind 24/7. I'm astonished they were able (left) to live independently, really.

I don’t know anyone in real life with the condition or by proxy. By proxy is actually very rare and is now known as Fabricated or Induced Illness now. I think the current thinking is more that health anxiety (often driven by the internet) is more the issue, rather then people tampering with results. So people genuinely believe their child has problems and then their actions worsen problems. So for example there child has a sore foot, they worry it’s broken, X-ray is fine, but child still in pain. They become convinced something is missed, don’t make child walk on foot etc.

As some other posters have mentioned, unfortunately accusations of FII are genuinely levelled at the Mother and often on baseless grounds. I also know a lot of women though who have been disbelieved by medical professionals. Told that they are just suffering “stress”, including a friend who had bowel cancer (and sadly died) and another friend who actually had MS.

It's a monumental abuse of resources and phenomenal waste of money, but I simply cannot imagine how terrifying it must be to be that person and to be trapped inside their mind 24/7. I'm astonished they were able (left) to live independently, really.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll To some extent they enjoy it, I mean they're constantly getting that 'hit' of attenton and drama. I suppose it might be a bit like an addiction and in the rare event any of them wanted to stop, they'd have to break the habit.

People can maybe snap out of it a bit if they have something else happening in their life to keep their interest- work or something.

I think maybe it can be linked to Borderline traits or other personaliity disorders.

I was accused of it for over three decades. The Drs insisted it was due to being fostered I actually have a severe medical phobia due to how I was treated, by everyone. Incidentally it was my (abusive) parents who gave them the idea I was making it up.

Even when diagnosed with my illnesses (all caused by an underlying genetic condition) I still got accused of it. In the end at my last hospital appointment having waited over twelve hours, no food or drink and had a hypo (which I was blamed for causing because I supposedly wanted to be admitted and couldn't "really" have diabetes) I lost my temper (dodgy blood sugars do nothing for my mental control) and demanded they rang my specialist in front of me after telling me they'd rang and he confirmed I was making everything up and was "fine and had tricked him into a diagnosis". They rang. It didn't end well for them. First, they never rang in the first place so lied to me, second they told him they could tell I was lying. The man was a specialist, one of the best in the world, they didn't stand a chance of convincing him with all his knowledge and test results and evidence that I'd faked it!

To be fair the specialist did warn me even with his details on my notes any diagnosis wouldn't be accepted.

The point is this is a highly damaging diagnosis to make. I've an aunt (now deceased) who had the same condition as me, and was diagnosed with it. Her cancer was missed.

I'm not denying it happens. It obviously does. But when you're admitted to a specialist hospital and every person you speak to had the same diagnosis which was wrong that's worrying.

@SophieKaczynsky

Weirdly all the people that I know that always claim to be ill or have ill children all claim to her Erlers Danlos and/or Fibromyalgia. I know that both are both extremely real and debilitating health conditions, but I find it hard to believe that they all have these conditions, plus children with every condition under the sun, too.

The thing is these conditions can have co-morbidities, so it can be hard to tell. For example, my son has epilepsy. There are quite a lot of co-morbidities associated with it. So far, it doesn't look like he has any of them but for example- lots of people who have epilepsy are also autistic. EDS is also associated with epilepsy. You could in theory have all 3. EDS is also largely inherited so it figures that other family members might also have it...

Lots of people with hypermobility disorders (including hEDS) get accused of this (fii) it is specifically mentioned in the RCGP Ehlers-Danlos toolkit with the tag line, "if you can't connect the issues, think connective tissues." Quite frankly connective tissues hold everything together so it is hardly surprising that lots of body systems are going to be a bit fucked.

According to academic research, those with HSDs have a higher incidence of other conditions such as autism, asthma, allergies, arthritis, gut issues, POTS, bladder issues, mast cell disorders....

Plus hypermobility is genetic passed on 50% of the time so it is likely that parents and child are going to be always having medical issues.

Try Marco Castori for academic papers or prof Graham though he is retired now. Many are linked to by the HSD society/charity in the UK. ( From where I got most of my info on DD and my HSD)

As someone who has genuine chonic conditions this is something that really annoys me.
I have (and have been properly diagnosed with etc) Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension, Nerve damage- now being simply referred to as fibromyalgia by the doctors! and a Not fully diagnosed, but obvious according to My neuros case of Functional Neurological syndrome disorder (FND)

Unfortunately all of these have been used by “fakers” as a result, everytime I’m genuinely ill it is so much more difficult to get taken seriously until I deteriorate considerably because of the stereotypes that have developed.

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.

I keep thinking of more people I've known in the past that I suspect have at the very least exaggerated their medical history.

When my youngest child was at primary school there was a mum who often walked with a stick but was always very cagey about why she needed said stick. She also, as has been mentioned upthread, only seemed to have her disability and her stick when it suited her. I saw her running on the treadmill at the gym for example, and then an hour later hobbling in the school gates with her stick where people would be holding the gate open for her and moving out of her way to let her through. She had two kids that also had apparent disabilities but again she was very vague about what they were

A big group of us went on a day trip to London and she took her stick and genuinely seemed to love the attention and the fact that everyone was fussing over her and giving her the best seat at the show we went to see, and carrying her bag for her.

I was diagnosed as borderline because I was fostered too.

To quote the "expert therapist" I saw at cmht "my parents didn't want me so what would anyone else want with me except abuse" when I got angry, given he told me my parents were lovely and I'd rejected them at birth and they DID abuse me, and my foster family didn't (and are long time dead) I was rightly annoyed, he took it as proof. This was decades ago. I still remember them and their kindness, yep like all kids there was telling off but that was all it was. My parents idea of telling me off was to bounce my head off a brick wall (I'm not kidding).

Turned out this "expert therapist" was nothing of the sort. He got fired for lying about his qualifications, as in he was doing a night course in counselling that was it. His professional qualifications didn't exist at all and when I reported him (over a decade before he was caught) I was then put in a room with him whilst he had a go at me for being extremely passive aggressive and unfair and a bully trying to get him fired when he just cared and wanted to help.

Now he's banned for life from ever registering as a therapist, or nurse (he also pretended to be a nurse) or working with any vulnerable people.

Yet the diagnosis of "borderline" is still on the front of my notes.

My underlying condition that's considered to be the root cause of all my physical needs is Ehlers Danlos Syndrome.

Have come across FII twice in 8 years of SW practice.

me4real. When I was diagnosed it was a whole process with very strict criteria. I have it mild to moderately and I am lucky not to have too many gastric problems. I have family members with it worse than I do but literally no one I have come across in RL with EDS come close to the women with it on YouTube. Oh actually there’s one woman who does seem very similar and in her 30s is in some sort of care home. She clearly has serious MH issues that I think are driving a lot of her eds problems. She is constantly posting on Facebook everything that’s going on with her and videos of her walking with her legs wobbling a lot while using crutches. She then reports that she fainted after she stopped filming due to POTS/dysautonomia or FND ( functional neurological disorder)I really feel for her.

There's a lot on Instagram, and also illness fakers on Reddit
MCAS seems to be the one at the minute (I have chronic urticaria and it comes up in the tags on insta sometimes)

But then I get the frustration at something not being right. I spent years in and out the doctors with infections and just not being well. Eight years it took for someone to look at every blood test and chart them and realise I had virtually no white blood cells which funnily = constant infections. I was diagnosed after that very quickly and on medication and now rarely need to see the GP!

@Becca19962014 So sorry you had those experiences. I hope you can get that taken off your notes somehow. xx I was misdiagnosed with Alcohol Dependency Disorder a couple of weeks before I was admitted to hospital wiith bipolar, and that's at the top of my notes. I hope to try and get it taken off soon.

You can imagine/will know from your own experience how it means doctors act towards me.

I was accused of having Borderline but got diagnosed with some ADHD in the end. If you can get them to consider what was actually happening, or to see new consultants, you might be able to get it taken off. My current consultant says 'everyone has traiits of something but if you really had Borderline, your life would be far more chaotic.'

@Tuesdayschildisfairofface I think it depends on your doctors as well. I know being put on a saline drip is like the best thing ever for me. Really seriously perks me up and that's recognised in literature for autonomic issues BUT it's also recognised that there's a rebound effect so it's not used as treatment in the U.K. whereas in the U.S. it is for autonomic issues.

EDS criteria was tightened, but many Drs don't actually know the criteria in the uk. It's usually just down to "being a bit bendy" when it's much much more than that.

Mine is severely effecting my neck, I was given two years before it collapsed and I died. It hasn't yet but I've been told it will and nothing can be done. It's a very rare thing to have happen but it does to some people and I was told my mental health has a role in that - I suffer with night terrors and PTSD which means my neck muscles are used a lot. My knees have already collapsed due to it, my one hip is totally wrecked.

@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.

That’s so sad. I do agree that some health professionals have health anxiety. I think I do following a mistake I witnessed that had serious consequences for the child. So I do worry excessively about things being missed.

@me4real I've tried, believe me but they won't budge. I don't even believe mental health diangoses actually help in my experience they just fuel prejudice.

No one cares what's actually happening.

If they did then they'd be forced to do something to help me...

Much easier to slap the borderline label on, and then manipulate everything to "prove it". Like the therapist I mentioned, despite being proven right that complaint against him is still used to prove I refuse to engage and stalk staff (hardly stalking is it to check someones qualifications! Or lack thereof in his case).

Sorry to hear that @Becca19962014 , I hope it doesn't turn out that way.

There are many different clinical types of EDS so I imagine the fakers/exaggerators have a very mild type that doesn't effect any significant bodily structures.

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll To some extent they enjoy it, I mean they're constantly getting that 'hit' of attenton and drama. I suppose it might be a bit like an addiction and in the rare event any of them wanted to stop, they'd have to break the habit.

People can maybe snap out of it a bit if they have something else happening in their life to keep their interest- work or something.

May well be, but it still can't be any kind of life wanting to spend all your days doing that. I could maybe understand somebody who 'loves the drama' doing it even once a week or so, but 5 or 6 times every single day?! You wouldn't get a single other thing done - ever - whether necessary or pleasurable, because your schedule was already jam-packed with spurious hospital visits.

Plus, I know the HCPs would be professional and civil with you, but they'd hardly be effusively friendly or sympathetic when they see that it's you yet again, wasting their time once more, would they?

@Becca19962014 I hope you come across some doctors/consultants who treat you well. Finding a (comparatively) good'un can make all the difference.

@me4real I've none at all now. Not even GP in 18 months. My conditions are so much worse now. It's a mess as they keep referring back to how things were then forgetting the illness deteriorates !!

It's very frightening doing it alone i admit. Even more so as I know my benefits are due to be renewed and won't be without any support at all.

Plus, I know the HCPs would be professional and civil with you, but they'd hardly be effusively friendly or sympathetic when they see that it's you yet again, wasting their time once more, would they?

@WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll No but then that becomes part of the soap opera. Medical Staff did X, Y, Z to me proclaimed all over FB etc.

I know of a notorious person online (won't name names in case I get post removed) apparently combines calling the fire brigade with flashing or something.

@Becca19962014 Am going to bed sooon buut sending you a PM x