Gregory clearly describes the distorted mentality of the abuser: characteristically for somebody with Munchausen's syndrome by proxy, her mother first gains the care and attention of a doctor, then threatens and tries to control the relationship by blaming professional incompetence for test results that, naturally, show nothing wrong with the child. And so help me God, if she dies on me because you can't find anything wrong with her, I'll sue you for every cent you've got." This kid is sick, all right? Just look at her. The phrase her mother used repeatedly becomes haunting: "Let's get to the bottom of what's wrong with this kid." And when she got fed up with her current doctor she'd say: "Look, dammit.
Her mother simply starved her so she would perform "better" in medical tests. They needed me smooth and hairless so the little white pads would stick to those points constellated around my heart and record my beats."Ĭhildren at school used to ask if she was anorexic. Medical staff would "lather me up and run a new plastic Bic between my barely-there breasts. "The part I hated most was the shaving," writes Gregory, who believes that MBP is simply a form of abuse, not a psychological disorder. Sickened, by Julie Gregory, a victim of Munchausen's syndrome by proxy, or MBP, is a harrowing but compelling account of the way her mother stole her childhood by making her into a sickly child always on the brink of a health crisis. In extreme cases the mother will put her child through unnecessary and life-threatening surgery so she can thrive in the role of an all-giving, all-caring parent. She may even induce illness or fake test results in her pursuit of doctors' attention and nurturance.
Over time she repeatedly fabricates symptoms of illness in her son or daughter - mental, physical or both - bringing the child to doctor after doctor to seek diagnoses for conditions that she invents. That other person is usually a child and the perpetrator its principal caretaker, almost always the mother. Munchausen's syndrome by proxy is regarded by doctors as a mental disorder in which a person looks for attention through another person.
A book published this week throws light on a much lesser-known, more insidious and also potentially lethal form of child abuse, one that usually remains hidden from view. Sometimes, however, the danger comes from within. A new account of growing up the victim of Munchausen's syndrome by proxy is harrowing reading, writes Sylvia Thompson.Ĭases such as that of Ian Huntley, the caretaker who murdered the English schoolgirls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, reinforce our fear of strangers and of the dangers outside our warm, nurturing homes.
0 kommentar(er)
