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Munchausen Syndrome By Proxy: Child Abuse
by Marc D. Feldman, M.D.
Too Much In Common
Kathleen Bush and Yvonne Eldridge had a lot in common. First, both cared for children with remarkably complex medical problems: Jennifer Bush suffered from constant intestinal problems, and Eldridge's two foster daughters experienced a host of ailments that left them weak and emaciated.
Second, both Bush and Eldridge spent most of their time escorting their sickly girls from doctor to doctor: Jennifer was eventually hospitalized 200 times, and all three children had to undergo surgery to place feeding tubes into their stomachs. And third, both parents received the highest praise for their exemplary devotion to their little charges: Bush was lauded by Hillary Clinton at a 1994 White House rally, while Eldridge was named national "Mother of the Year" in 1988 by Nancy Reagan.
Yet prosecutors now maintain that Kathleen Bush and Yvonne Eldridge shared one more feature, a dark secret only recently exposed to the glare of television shows and newspapers around the world. Bush and Eldridge are accused of having a strange psychiatric ailment called "Munchausen syndrome by proxy" that led them to manufacture the girls' illnesses to meet their own needs for attention and sympathy. Bush is alleged to have deliberately poisoned and infected her daughter, Eldridge to have starved her foster children and reported symptoms that never really existed.
A Web of Deceit
The term "Munchausen syndrome by proxy" (MSBP) was coined around twenty years ago, and hundreds of reports have appeared since then. In most cases, a mother either claims that her child is sick, or she goes even further to actually make the child sick. This "devoted" parent then continually presents the child for medical treatment, all the while denying any knowledge of the origin of the problem--namely, herself.
As a result, MSBP victims may undergo extraordinary numbers of lab tests, medication trials, and even surgical procedures that aren't really needed. For example, by the age of eight, Jennifer Bush had had more than 40 operations, including the removal of much of her intestines. Other children have scarcely experienced a day of their young lives without being brought to the doctor's office or confined to the hospital. In the vast majority of cases, the perpetrator is the mother and the victim an infant or toddler.
The web of deceit the caregiver spins can be buttressed by medical signs and symptoms that mislead the most skillful of physicians. Their acting skills can match those of a veteran performer. For instance, the MSBP perpetrator might induce "apnea" (a cessation of breathing) by suffocating her child to the point of unconsciousness, then frantically display the limp child to the hospital or clinic staff as the tears roll down her cheeks.
She may secretly place a drop of blood in the child's urine specimen, then appear aghast at lab results that alarm the unsuspecting physicians and nurses. Behind closed doors, she may scrub the child's skin with oven cleaner to cause a baffling blistering rash that lasts for months. Since it may take many years of illness for doctors finally to arrive at the truth, it should not be surprising that this form of child abuse has a mortality rate of nine percent.
Struggling to Understand
Why would anyone do such a thing? That question haunts everyone who encounters MSBP, since few other behaviors so sharply challenge our concept of what "motherhood" is supposed to be all about. Typically, it seems, the MSBP parent is on a misguided mission to feel "special," to garner attention from people--family, friends, and community--as the heroic caretaker of a tragically ill child. Other perpetrators crave a perverse relationship with doctors in which they simultaneously engage and defeat them through their carefully-crafted deceptions. And virtually all have personality disorders that lead them to behave in odd and even destructive ways, especially when they feel under stress.
Protecting the Defenseless
When MSBP is suspected, health care providers are required by law in all fifty states to report their concerns. Since MSBP can be a deadly form of abuse, law enforcement will usually step in to investigate while social service agencies focus on the highest priority of all: ensuring continued protection of the child. Though the media frenzy surround the startling cases of Kathleen Bush and Yvonne Eldridge has already faded away, the rest of us bear the responsibility of continuing to educate ourselves and others about MSBP. Each of us will need to carry the banner for the appropriate recognition of this perplexing phenomenon and, in so doing, help to protect those who are too young to protect themselves.
About the Author:
Marc D. Feldman, M.D. is the co-author of "Patient or Pretender: Inside the Strange World of Factitious Disorders" (1994) and co-editor of "The Spectrum of Factitious Disorders" (1996).
Revised 10/19/08 by Marlene M. Maheu, Ph.D.
my sisters life has been ruined because my mother has been labeled as having munchausens. she has been sick since she was born, 2 months premature, and has been fighting her whole life with a disease called hydrocephalus. due to brain damage from blocked shunts, my sister has developed seizures. they were bad for a couple years, having 4 or 5 a week. then it went down to 3 a month, and now its back to one every couple days. the doctors recently told my sister that she was 'faking her seizures'. how horrible is that? a girl whos life is severly affected by these terrible siezures, being told that she is faking it. im sure that the "munchausen's" type of child abuse exists out there, but im almost certain that there are more people wrongfully accused then who do that to their child.
I always knew my mother was not "normal" and only recently, after having read up on Munchausen, I realised that her condition was most definitely Munchausen Syndrome. It was such an integral part of her personality that my father and us, her children, lived with it without questioning and just endured lifelong emotional suffering. It is my belief that my father died early on in retirement through unbearable strain inflicted on him by my mother`s constant belief that she was dying of cancer, however never to be diagnosed. She lived to be 83 years old and once asked me to overdose her with something she had aquired somewhere. When I refused she proceeded to ignore my attention, visits and attempts at conversation. She died after giving me my last scolding on not caring for her, turning her head away from me at any attempt from my side to converse.
The bigest worry I have in life however, is that it is almost a dead certainty that my daughter in law is suffering Munchausen by proxy. Her children dare not have a wet upperlip and into hospital with various specialists in attendance, almost every 3 months. The M.sufferers are master manipulators and almost impossible to convince of anything other than what their mind believes.
My brother in law married this girlw who we suspect has MSBP. She drove over herself when he told her, that he could no longer pick her up to take her to school. When my husband had his bachelor party, she texted his brother and said she was having seizures and comos, and needed him to come home ASAP. She said she had pancreatitis cancer, then said it was in remission. She just had baby, and we are starting to hear stories. My little nephew fell of the sofa onto a carpet floor and she waited until her husband (my brother in law) got off work to take the kid to the hospital. I am very scared what she might do to this little baby. She is sick in the head, and she is only 24 years old.
I think my mother inlaw has this disease.She lives in Tepatitlan, Jalisco Mexico so it is accepted. Her daughter has been sick since she has been a baby. Now every time she wants to gather all her family together her daughter supposidly takes a turn for the worst. I dont understand how a person can be suffering from cancer for her entire life and grow into womanhood still be suffering from such a serious ailment and still be living. Im positive she has been and is manipulating her daughters illness for attention and to feel needed. I am very afraid for myself because her children think this a normal way of life and are suffering. Her kids always seem sick and she is always injecting someone, orally medicating, or cooking up some herbal concoction for them to drink. Her husband is dying of diabetes according to what my husband tells me. She is constantly trying to lure my husband back to Mexico with the exuse that his sister is dying, but the one time I went there she seemed in perfect health. She has been succesful in luring my husband back there and I havent heard from him in two weeks. I'm almost sure she has him laying in bed nursing him with some herbal concoction. Now that I know about this disease I am really afraid for his wellbeing. She displays almost all of the symptoms. She is a
nurse, her husband abused her and was away alot. She probably has been using her children for many years to lure her husband home as well. I dont know what to do.
I am finally admitting to myself at 40 how badly I suffered at the hands of my parents and MSBP. It was actively mom but dad did nothing to stop it and he knew. Abuse that I know of started at 2 with three poisonings that required charcoal and stomach pumping at ER. It went on from there and I agree with the post that these people never get better. she still uses me-well she did-I have finally closed the door calmly but permanently and am working on healing myself. Her abuse affected me every day- after injecting the poisons my lungs were affected and developed severe asthma that she used to make me sick all the time doing the opposite of what the docs said to do to prevent it. They gave her ideas on what to do by telling her what she really shouldnt do. So i was sick every day of childhood and in charge of my own med routine by 7, 1st grade. kept track of all my prescriptions and had to know when to take them and OHHH when refill time came around it was hell. She would have to pay the copay so i'd be yelled at for days about the pills. Good luck to anyone who has gone through this trauma and I pray for your healing. And YES get away and move towards a peaceful life.
My mother suffers from this. A doctor confronted her when I was three, she stopped taking me to the doctors... She tortured me for years. She would let me catch infections, usually skin infections and pull my skin off with tweezers and needles to treat the infections... she burnt me with hot towels to pull out the infections. She pulled out my brothers adult teeth and talked me into pulling off my own thumb nail. These people DON"T stop just because the doctors call their bluff... the Treatments become sadistic home remedies. PLEASE DON"T confront someone with MBPS unless you are willing to put them in Jail or kill them. They will never stop.
I'm 31 now, and I survived. This Christmas she threw my dog into a frozen pond and claimed that she Saved him. THESE PEOPLE DONT GET BETTER. Once you figure it out get as far away from them as you can. I KNOW how charismatic they are, but if your their victim just remember they DONT love you.
You will NEVER be safe, not you, your pets, your family your dog, or god forbid your child.
what do you do when someone says you have msbp and you prove you dont have it?? how can you win to get your kids back?? my x says i have this and my son has had to have several surgurys to say his life. he was born very ill and the doctors told me what was wrong and they said he need to have them done to save his life. and after 6 yrs his dad is mad cause child support is after him. and its been proven that he has abused the kids in every way. the kids told cps cps and the police what he has done to them. now they took my kids from me and he is saying i have this. i have all the medical proof what has had to be done and why. he has the judge beleaveing i'm a liar and that all the medical records are fake. i need help. when my son was 4 months old i found out he has hydrocepheslis. and cps tryed to charge us with sids. and i passed my lie detector test and he never did. but they still let him off
i got it.catch me.with net info on it.i can out smart it.
Help!
My wife hase MBP without question. I filed for divorce a year ago. Since then, I requested my daughter's medical records......never sick, has had 600+ tests, scans, blood work, ambulances....history unremarkable...
My wife is a Nurse Midwife, and was sexually abused as a teen by her father.
My daughter and wife exaggerate, lie and use harsh words to decsribe normal activities aparent experiences....
My step-children have been victums to this horrible crime. The mother had Munchausen Syndrome herself for many many years before the children were born. Day-care workers, school, officials, family and friends have questioned this for years. I have all the past medical information, including the nurses notes where she tells them what tests to do etc. I need a Doctor to look them over. I have searched and searched for one who specializes in this who can help. Do you have any suggestions? They are older with warts and viruses, and we are wondering if that can be a long-term reaction to what she was doing? We need to give certain information to the doctors. Thank you.