Gypsy Rose Blanchard Prison Hygiene and Beauty Hacks: Answers to What Went Viral
To understand Blanchard's mouth and hygiene journey, one must look at Springfield, Missouri, not the Chillicothe cell blocks. For nearly two decades, Dee Dee Blanchard subjected Gypsy to Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another (formerly Munchausen syndrome by proxy). Dee Dee insisted Gypsy suffered from chronic physical degradation.
Doctors prescribed unnecessary seizure medications, sedatives, and feeding-tube liquid diets that stripped her natural enamel. Dee Dee also had surgeons remove Gypsy's salivary glands because her mother complained about excessive drooling. Saliva buffers oral acids. Without it, teeth decay rapidly, leading directly to the widespread extractions Gypsy endured before she was twenty years old. Prison did not destroy Gypsy Rose Blanchard's teeth. In a strange inversion of institutional life, prison provided the first environment where medical professionals evaluated her mouth without maternal interference.
