Gypsy Rose Blanchard on Life as a Free Woman and New Mother

As a child, Gypsy Rose Blanchard's life was claustrophobically small. A victim of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, Gypsy endured chronic abuse by her malignantly controlling mother, Clauddine "Dee Dee" Blanchard. Dee Dee would imagine that her daughter was suffering from extreme diseases, and then force the child into extreme treatment: a feeding tube, a wheelchair, the surgical removal of her salivary glands.

To escape the abuse, Gypsy Rose enlisted the help of a boyfriend, Nicholas Godejohn, who stabbed Dee Dee to death.

Godejohn was charged with first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison plus 25 years. But due, in part, to the extreme and abnormal child abuse Gypsy had suffered, the prosecution offered her a more lenient plea deal for her role in the murder. She was charged with second-degree murder and freed on parole in December 2023 after serving eight and a half years.

After her release, Gypsy Rose went to live with her husband, Ryan Anderson, whom she married while still behind bars. However, she soon reconnected with an ex-boyfriend, Ken Urker. Her first child with Urker, a daughter named Aurora Raina Urker, was born on December 28, 2024.

A little over a year after her release, Gypsy Rose spoke with A&E about her new life as a free woman and a new mother.

You've had quite a year. As you settle into your new life on the outside, do you spend much time thinking about the crime that landed you in prison nearly a decade ago?

I see a few therapists a few times a month. And one thing we cover is my trauma. Working through the past is going to be a forever journey for me. That's not something that ends with my parole; that's through the rest of my life.

I want to dive into more of my past than the trauma of the crime…and how I make my past not affect my present. That's something I'm working on, and it's not something someone gets overnight. But it's more about how I'll be different from my mom.

Do you have regrets?

Yes. I think about how I should've reached out to my dad. I look at my past and think about how I could've done this and that. I put a lot of criticism on myself. And I think the public does too: 'Why didn't you go for help,' that kind of thing. And I don't think they understand the mindset of a victim. You really do kind of bond with your abuser. And you feel like nobody else will love you but them.

That's not something most people have experienced. And I'm glad they haven't.

Since leaving prison, you've become a mother. How has that affected you?

It's made me a lot more mature. It's made me really have to analyze my priorities. Coming out of prison, I wanted to do this and go there and have this experience and that experience and be very carefree. I was to the wind, acting on emotion and impulse.

But I have a child now. And so, I'm a lot more mindful about my decisions in life because they affect her as well.

Some people say becoming a parent makes you look at your own childhood and your own parents in a different way. Has that been your experience?

It has. Some negative. I wish I could say that I can relate to my mom. I wish I could give you that answer, that I see her point of view now. But that's just not it. It just isn't. If anything, I see that I'm more lost in the questions that I have.

I just don't have the mindset that my mom did, to relate to her.

Have you thought about how you'll tell your daughter about your own family history, when she's older?

When that time comes—obviously we don't have to have that discussion right away—we plan to reach out to a child therapist who can guide us as we slowly introduce that to her. We knew that would come about. And doing that with a therapist is probably the smartest way.

Are you doing any advocacy work with Munchausen by proxy?

I want to. Over the last year, a lot has happened in my life, and so I wanted to wait until I did get to the point where it was something I could handle. Now things are starting to slow down.

There's a lot I want to do, but I'm also giving myself grace. I've only been out a year. Let me put my feet on the ground first—put my mask on myself first before putting a mask on someone else.

Something that comes up a lot on your show, Gypsy Rose: Life After Lock Up, is the impact celebrity has on your life. You're understandably bothered by the criticism you receive from the public, but—since you're actively seeking out the public eye—do you see a benefit in living your life openly, like this?

It's always been a love/hate relationship. I choose to put myself in the public eye for the purpose of showing what I can do. I feel like everybody has taken my voice from me. And taken my power. And the show has given that power back to me. I take control of the narrative and say, 'this is how I'm feeling right now.' I can say what happened, [viewers] can see it happen and there's nothing that gets lost in translation.