And That's Why We Drink - E399 Em’s Day O' Fun and a Ghost Renovator

Episode Date: September 29, 2024

It’s Episode 399 and there’s drama in Chair City! Today Em takes us to Massachusetts for the tale of the haunted S.K. Pierce Mansion, complete with a ghost who paints. Then Christine brings us her very first case update (and recap) all the way back from Episode 15 with the story of Gypsy-Rose Blanchard. And have we always been in an apple orchard? Our Ovilus seems to think so… and that’s why we drink!Our new book A Haunted Road Atlas: Next Stop is finally here! Check out your local indie bookstore or visit bit.ly/HRANextStop to get your copy today!Come see our brand new live show: The Pour Decisions Tour which is sure to bring plenty of gasps, laughs, and frights! Get your tickets at: andthatswhywedrink.com/live

Someone sounds like they've got a little cold. No, this is literally just the same whatever it was from when we were still prepping the tour. I've just become my body is falling apart. Well, you look great. I couldn't have you you just sound sniffily, but your eyeliner is, mwah. Oh, thank you.

I'm not wearing any eyeliner, but thank you so much. So you're like Gio, you're just born with it. I wish. No, I just might. You know how like we said, oh, after we finish prepping the show, we can crash. I have not slept like a full night. Like I've developed insomnia.

I don't know, I can't sleep at night It's just horrible. I'm just so ill like everything's just Hurting me. Oh my gosh. You really do sound like maybe you just have a cold my friend I think no, I've had well It turned into it was Leona's cold and then it turned into a sinus infection. And so now I'm treating that And that doesn't bother me at all. It's just the lack of sleep is like slowly killing me So I can't get better because I'm not sleeping. So it's like...

Oh my gosh. Yeah, it's just terrible. Is it just like the woes of being a mom and having to run after a kid? Or is it like you really like even at night when you're on your own? I literally lay there and I'm like for hours tossing and turning, I can't fall asleep. It's just horrible. And then I wake up every hour in like a panic and then can't fall back asleep I've just developed some weird sleeping issue

I'm so sorry. Thank you I I was really hoping like once that once we finished the the crazy all-nighters that I would just kind of like let my body Catch up. Yeah No, I'd like I think it likes the thrill of like just constant adrenaline Waking me up. I don't know. I don't know. Have you done anything to like give yourself

like a relaxing moment? No. Okay, so maybe that needs to happen. I don't know how to do that. I don't know how to do that. Like if you're like forced, like forced, I mean, I'm saying this to like someone who really doesn't have a lot of time on their hands,

but like making yourself have like a day where you just don't get off the couch or you just take a hot shower or... But then I start to feel depressed, like, oh shit, I'm just in the house all day doing that. I don't know. I just, I can't... When? I can't find...

What? When? You can't win because either you're going to be stressed or depressed. Oh, I can't win. Yeah, I can't win. because either you're gonna be stressed or depressed. Oh, I can't win, yeah, I can't win. I just like, I hate sitting still for so long, but then I filled out my, oh my God, my therapist had me fill out, we're recording, aren't we?

Yeah, oh well. My therapist had me fill out these forms every couple of months of like, just the classic depression screener and anxiety screener. And I'm just filling it out and I submit it, and we're just chatting. And then she kind of like stops. And I'm like just filling it out and I submit it and we're just chatting and then she kind of like stops and I'm like what?

She goes, both of them have gone up six points since you started here in January. And I was like, is that a lot? And she's like, I mean, it's like a third of the whole score. And I was like, oh my God. Oopsies. So now I'm failing that. I don't know, I just, I don't know.

I'm just falling apart, but our shows were really fun. I know, you know, I was gonna, I don't know. I just I don't know. I'm just falling apart, but our shows were really fun I know, you know, I was gonna I don't know how to like turn no talk talk about something happy This is nobody wants to hear a bummer About nothing so oh I mean I did but okay. Um, yes our shows went great and Now there's no reason to be stressed right Christine, right? Okay, just drink drink lots of coffee. And blow your nose or something, I don't know. Take a nap.

Oh, don't worry. I'll blow my nose plenty. Oh, I think you just need a good sleep. And I just don't know how to give it to you. Well, my ring, my aura ring this morning, I woke up and it was like, something's wrong. I was like, oh really, is it? Thanks.

And it was like- Have you tried a hospital, Christine? What's going on here? It literally said, you're waking up every hour and you've never had such disrupted sleep since you got this thing a year ago. And I was like, I don't know. I don't have a new, like it's like life changes,

newborn at home. I was like, nope, none of that, just. I mean, it was certainly getting ready for our show was a whole new shock to our systems. It was a shock to our systems. That is true. It was certainly something we've never had to deal with before. I don't know why it was so different from the previous times. But I'll tell you off air so we don't give any spoilers. And I can guess what you're probably going to say.

But I mean, the name of the tour show is poor decisions. So, uh, folks, we're just trying to live up to that standard, that high standard we've set for ourselves. Next tour, we're not gonna maybe make the same poor decisions. I hope not. Maybe we'll make different, less sleep deprived poor decisions.

But why are you drinking? Tell me something about you. It was gonna be that I'm really proud of us for the tour and that we can both go to sleep now. Oh, well, I mean, I want to go to sleep now. I'm hoping that my body figures it out. I think it's just taking too long to reset. Like, it's like, are we still stressed? And I'm like, no. And it's like panicking. So I think once I crash, I'll crash really hard and it'll be fine. But yeah, I'm very proud of us too, Em, and poor Eva, and poor us, and poor everybody

who had to be part of our lives. Yeah, that was rough. No, I was just going to say I was really proud of us, and I was going to say I hope you're feeling more relaxed, but I guess not. So now I'll say I hope you're drinking a lot of... I was for a minute. I hope you're drinking a lot of warm milk or something, and things will eventually get sleepy for you. Thank you. I'm glad. I hope you're drinking a lot of warm milk or something and things will eventually get sleepy for you.

Thank you. I'm glad. I hope you're feeling better too. I feel fine. Great. Good. Listen, one of us has to feel good at one point. We're always back and forth, you know?

Yeah, I'm good. I mean, now I'm just like the only stress I have is house stress, but that's, you know, compared to what we were going through, I'm fine. So anyway, that's it. I for me, I spent a long weekend in New York with my family. I which I am taking now as like, I really want to like celebrate, you know, us being done with a tour. And I kept telling myself, I have these things called M's day of fun. And a lot of times they're like to celebrate a really hard stressor I've been going through, or like if we've been, if I've been dealing with a lot,

then I like I'll schedule M's day of fun where I, maybe that's what you need. You have to have Christine's day of fun. I was about to say, that just sounds so horrible. I mean, it sounds fun, but like so much energy, right? Do you, do you go do stuff? No. What's a day of sun look like for you?

It depends on what I wanna do that day, but I schedule a day where I just don't do anything except whatever I want. Oh, what was that? What have you done? Well, like what did you do for this one? Well, the plan was originally, it always changes, but if I don't have a plan,

the default would be like just like play VR and watch TV and watch TikToks and bed rot and not feel bad about it. But this time around, I think it just turned into me being with my family for the weekend. But I had a lot of fun with my cousin. In hindsight, my aunt and uncle are very sick of me and I don't think they want to see me for like another full calendar year. What do you mean? I think they're just getting older

and I think they felt overwhelmed about like having to host someone for multiple days. Oh no. And I don't have to think about it. It was pretty clear. Wait, are you serious? Oh no, I'm sorry. But my cousin and I had a great time.

That's what matters, I guess. Yeah, now we both have an inside joke about how we'll- Now you're written out of the will and it's all good. Yeah, well just, Tanner and I had a great time. That's what matters, I guess. Yeah, now we both have an inside joke about how we'll- Now you're written out of the will and it's all good. Yeah, well just, Tanner and I now know that after two days it's time to leave. I mean, I spent every day with you last week, every waking, and not every day, every waking moment of every day and every night.

I can't imagine ever getting sick of you. You know, you say that, but I actually didn't get sick of you once, so it's weird that you would feel the difference. Well, to be fair, most of the time we were just in silence and then we'd give each other the finger. Yeah. Like once every hour it would be like, go to hell, just like out of the blue.

We developed some severe behavioral issues being in the same room for days on end with no sleep. And so yeah, anyway, clearly I did not recover well, but I had fun while it lasted. Every time I was with you, I kept thinking there's no one else I'd rather do this with. Oh, that's I mean, to be fair, yeah, I don't think I would want to be under the roof with anybody else. So for what it's worth. Anyway, I think I've discovered a time limit on my stays there.

And that's fine. People have different time limits. I love that my only concept of your whole trip was like those pictures of you in the graveyard. And now I'm like, what happened? I had a great time at the cemetery. That was the day before any of us got sick. Oh, no, because I looked so happy. It was happy. Ironically, the happiest time was when we were in a cemetery. I get it. Listen, you're talking to the right person. I get it. But we know I have a bunch of family members buried in this one cemetery. And so it was a big cleaning day.

I had a lot of ancestors get through it. We only got through like half of them. So, yikes. Sorry to everybody else. But it's just so out of the way. So I think us being there made my aunt feel like, oh, we should all go. It's like it's a road trip to get there. And so I think after a long day of driving and her taking us around, I think the next day she wanted to relax and then felt like she couldn't.

So I think it just got, I think she's also sleepy. I think it's just a world of sleepy people right now. I think everyone just needs a nap. I think everyone needs a nap. I just wish someone would give me some Ambien or something. I've never tried that and I feel worried to try it, but I feel, I don't know. The reviews are lovely.

Yeah. Well, I feel like if I go to the doctor, they're going to be like, well, here's a sleeping thing. And I'm like, okay, great. But also then I'm like, doesn't it make you sleepwalk and have weird dreams and shit? Have you done magnesium glycinate? I've done everything. I take that every day. I take, I take melatonin. I mean, I probably just have washed out my body with all this stuff and it doesn't react anymore. I take Benadryl. Sometimes I take Benadryl. Sometimes I take Tylenol PM. Sometimes I take-

Have you tried the Sleepy Girl cocktail that's on TikTok? That seems to work very well. I mean, I feel like if all these pharmaceuticals aren't working, but maybe, maybe I need to try a- Sleepy Girl cocktail. What is it again? Something about cranberries. I don't know. You can look it up. It's a... Sleepy Girl cocktail. What is it again? Something about cranberries. I don't know. You can look it up.

It's a People's Sweat by It. I mean, I take full on... I'll take a Kalanpun to help me fall asleep sometimes and I still will be up for hours. So I'm like, I don't know if a sleepy... Maybe it'll be the one missing link. Maybe the sleepy girl. I don't want to knock it. Maybe you need cranberries or cherries or whatever it is.

Well good luck to you in your sleep. Well, thanks. If I knew what would make things better, I would send it to you overnight. Thank you. I mean, maybe this is it. Maybe it's, oh, like I typed in sleepy cocktail and it was like, you mean mocktail?

And I was like, oh man, yeah, I guess I mean mocktail. You know, Emsdale fun includes a lot of mocktails. Cherry juice and magnesium powder. That's it, yeah, yeah, yeah. But they swear by it. I don't know, givemsdale fun includes a lot of mocktails. Cherry juice and magnesium powder. That's it. Yeah. But they swear by it. I don't know. Give it a whirl.

How desperate are you? Well, there's actually a supplement in it. I thought it was just going to be like cherry juice. And I was like, then I'll just have to pee. But if maybe the magnesium is the kicker. I've been told that if melatonin doesn't work for you, magnesium glycinate, especially if you have ADHD, it seems to work better. And that's what I take a lot of times.

Is it glycinate or glycanate? I guess it's glycinate. I mean, I've always said glycinate and no one's corrected me, but also maybe everyone's just very nice. Except me. I'm like, hi. I don't even know how to say it. And here I am correcting you.

Standard. Sorry. My behavioral issues haven't settled since our big week. Oh, fun. Oh, terror. Yeah. Oh, horrors. Well, anyway, I had a lot of fun in New York. I went to Sleepy Hollow. I did my cousin and I were trying to figure out what to do. We took my gammy who passed away. She left her car at my aunt's house. And so we took it for a joy ride. We ended up in Jersey. We went to a big mall. It was very lovely. And we bonded. That was nice.

That sounds wonderful. Okay. Let's see. I have a story for you. Are you ready? Yay. It's pretty good. You tell me actually.

Okay. I'll be the judge of that. This is the S.K. Pierce Manor or Mansion, depending on which article you're reading. Oh, for just a brief moment, I thought it was a boat because you said S, the S. The SS Pierce Manor. But SK, okay. SK, for Sylvester K. I never got his middle name.

Let's say Keith. Okay. Sylvester Keith. Which by the way, Sylvester, that's one of those names that I have on a baby list that I know I'll never use, but I actually do secretly love. I know, but you're like, but I want to keep it on the list because I do like it. I'll never admit to it until it becomes popular and then all of a sudden I'll be like, I had it on my list forever. I came up with that first.

Yeah, you're just not bold enough to use it. That's how I was with Oliver and Owen. Those were names I've had literally for at least 15 years of my life on a list. And then they got big. That means that every millennial also had it on their list, which probably means we were all waiting to have our own kids. Maybe, but every single time I suggested Oliver or Owen,

people would go, oh, really? So maybe I was just with the wrong crowd. But Sylvester's also on that list, and the day it gets big, I want everyone to know, hear it here first. I fucking claimed it. This is the evidence. I know you don't usually like old-timey names, so this is kind of a fun twist.

I like that you like that name that makes me happy. Well I like three things about it. One, the nickname is Sly. I like that. Wait, no it's not. It's Sill. It's Sill. I mean, unless you're dyslexic, which is fine, but S-Y-L.

I've never met anyone named Sill. I've met people named Sly and it was short for Sylvester. Are you being serious? Why would I make... This is like the dumbest joke to make. Why would I make that up? That's the stupidest joke I could make. I'm not saying you're joking.

I just don't understand. I don't understand why it would be Sly. Maybe because Sly was an actual word and people thought that was better than Sil. I don't know. Yeah, I think I'm also just thinking like... You're sleepy, Christine. It's okay. I know, I know. I guess't know. Yeah, I think I'm also just thinking like. You're sleepy Christine, it's okay. I know, I know.

I guess it is a nickname. I think I just, in Germany, it's like, Sylvester is like a name in Germany, like a relatively common name and the nickname is not Sly. So I'm like, maybe. Maybe both exist. I mean, you can do anything with a name. I was gonna say silly, which is not a name either.

People call themselves rock now, so you can do it everywhere. Right, well, what about Sylvie? That's kind of cute, Sylv not a name either. People call themselves Rock now, so you can do it everywhere. Right, well what about Sylvie? That's kind of cute, Sylvester, Sylvie. See, that's where we run different courses. You don't like that? Nah. Well, it also means for it, the woods.

I like that, but I also like the cat, obviously. Right, right, obviously. And then one of my favorite movies when I was a little kid was Baby Geniuses, and the main character there was Sylvester, whose nickname was Sly, by the way. Oh, okay, well listen, I've been proven wrong by probably you and everybody on Instagram, I'm sorry. And all the Baby Geniuses, the main character there was Sylvester, whose nickname was Sly, by the way. Oh, okay, well, listen, I'm being proven wrong by probably you and everybody on Instagram, I'm sorry.

And all the Baby Geniuses, that's exactly right. Yeah, exactly, why would I ever question their authority? I'm so sorry. The Baby Geniuses. I'm so sorry. Okay, so anyway, love the name Sylvester. So let's move on. In Germany, you know what Sylvester means? It's the name of the New Year holiday.

Oh, fun. So if you wanted another reason, Sylvester is December 31st, that's when they celebrate Sylvester. So if you want another reason to like the name. It's like New Year. How do you feel about Keith? No comment.

Yeah, same, okay. Let's keep it to K, let's see. Okay, it's just Sylvester K. Okay, so note, most of the information from this comes from the book called Bones in the Basement Surviving the S.K. Pierce Haunted Victorian Mansion. Surviving it? Wow. Which again, what is with names and titles as long as the fucking book. Like our fucking podcast.

Yeah, exactly. So this is from Gardner, Massachusetts, and the man the mansion is named after the OG owner Sylvester Pierce, who Sly Keith, Sly KP. Yeah, that's right. And he manufactured furniture and apparently he did so well that his business was so successful that the town became nicknamed chair City, which- Shut up! I feel like of all the furniture, Chair, like I would not want to be Chair City.

I'd want to be like Couch City or something like Cozier. Oh, yeah, Sofa City. Well, that does sound like a Sturtmore joint. Table Town? Table Town. I mean, there's so many other options. Chair City just feels a little too like poised and proper. What about like Comfey County or Cozy County?

Cozy County. But a chair's not cozy. Are you fucking kidding? That's what I'm saying. It's not cozy. You're right. They'd be lying if they said cozy. It has to be like, sit up straight city.

Yeah. I would almost want something with daybed in it. Or like... Mmm. A chaise lounge. Ooh. Chaise lounge shitty., chaise lounge. Shitty, the shitty city.

OK, OK, we've gone too far. So chair city. When building this mansion, Sylvester paid a huge team to build around the clock, and it still took them about two years to build it. So it was that big. I think the last one of the sources I saw said that it was like over 20 rooms. Yeah. Jesus, yeah. Jesus. Okay. I mean, I'm sorry. I forgot what year is this?

I wasn't really paying attention. I haven't given a year yet. It's okay. Um, it looks, I mean, I was totally paying attention the whole time. So I was like, your eyes are like kind of nodding off. I was Googling Sylvester like still for no reason anyway. Um, okay. So it took two years for them to build and then by 1875, that's when they moved in. So the building was interestingly 666 zero square feet. Ooh, they were like 666 won't do.

I know, I think it's six more square feet. It would have been 6666 I guess. six. Oh yeah. Yeah. Whatever. Um, but it had multiple entrances for house staff. It had a Butler's pantry. It had bells throughout the house to communicate with one another. It had ornate woodwork details, big fireplaces, and two indoor cisterns to gather rainwater to provide indoor plumbing. Jesus. I know. I mean, I would have also waited two years for a house

if it was going to give me a toilet. I mean, nowadays people build houses for each other. Potty. Latrine mill. I don't know. My brain is broken today. It's scrambled as all. Wow.

OK. Anyway, go on. So in 1875, he moves in his wife, Susan, and they're, I don't know why it's stated this way, but their adult son, Frank, I feel like if you're going to move into a literal over 6,000 square foot house, maybe your adult son can fucking move. It's not like weird that he has a place there. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, he heard there's a toilet.

I feel like I'm not living with my wife. Forget it. She doesn't have a toilet. Exactly. If I found out that I was moving into this house with Alison or the exact same house with a toilet, I guess which one I'm picking. Bye Alison. Okay, so moved in with wife Susan

and their adult son, Frank, who, okay. Poor Frank. After however long their relationship was and then waiting two years to move into this place, two weeks into living, their Susan dies. Oh, no. From some infection. They don't really sell. No.

This is where I did a bit of a deep dive, whoopsies, because it said in the notes that the expected mourning period was two years. You know we love this in this morning stuff, Victorian morning. And I went, that's not enough information for me. So- You said it's not enough time.

And I was like, okay, M, that feels like you're not allowed to say that, but- As a narcissist, it certainly is. Not if I die. Decade minimum. Okay, so, yeah. So, Saoirse wrote the expected mourning period was two years. And I was like, I'm not, that's not for me.

Elaborate. So here we go. Speak on that. Yeah, so let's do this. So in the late 1800s, I looked up the mourning period of each century, LOL. It's basically an 1800 situation. But the mourning period and the mourning rituals in general

were very public, very visual, fell mostly on women, of course, because guess what? They're more moral than men, of course. Right, for sure. They have to uphold the moral standard. Literally that's why, because because they are within control and thought and reason more. But god forbid they can fucking vote. Okay, so. No, they're not that reasonable. They get hysterical every once a month. We can't help that. They wear black beautifully, but God forbid that they have a fucking thought, yuck. God forbid they bleed in the White House or something. God.

So anyway, black attire was worn because it represented one's inner sorrow. There are, do you wanna know how many stages of mourning? Do you, we wanna guess how many stages of mourning? Obviously, probably stupid question, but this is different from many stages of mourning? Do you, we want to guess how many stages of mourning? Obviously probably stupid question, but this is different from the stages of grief, correct? Stages of mourning. Okay.

That requires psychology and science. I was like, oh, I know this. No, I don't know this. Okay. Are there 13? That seems two on the nose. I don't know. There's six, six, six.

No, it's three stages of mourning. Three, okay, few. That seems a lot more reasonable. There's deep mourning, ordinary mourning, six, six. No, it's three stages of mourning. Three, okay, phew, that seems a lot more reasonable. There's deep mourning, ordinary mourning, LOL, and then half mourning. Half mourning, that feels like half-assed mourning. I know, well, so half, our ordinary mourning is also called second mourning

because I guess it's the second phase. But it's supposed to- And for those of you who are half-tuning in, we're saying mourning with a U. Like if you're like a morning ritual, like a morning ritual. Yeah. There are also three stages to my morning ritual, which is sleep, continue to sleep,

see the clock and then go back to sleep. Yeah. So deep morning, it's supposed to be as if it's a gradient. Like you're in deep morning, then you're kind of like dealing with ordinary amounts of grief and then you're going through a half amount of grief. And you're like phasing it out Okay, yes, and that's what the clothes are supposed to represent too

So you start with really only blacks and then eventually you start you start working into start working colorful clothing back into your fashion so Deep morning you have dull with no sheen black fabrics. It's put nothing Catching nothing fun at all. You are just miserable and your clothes reflect that. And you have to wear clothes, that sucks too. I know, I can't just- If I'm miserable, just like don't take me out of my shark T-shirt

that I'm currently wearing, see? Can't you just starfish naked on the bed and just cry it out, you know? Come on, it's one stage of mourning, it's all we need. So then ordinary mourning is you are still expected to wear all black, but you can kind of incorporate some like simple jewelry, simple trimmings on your clothes. It's like, how do you, that sounds like the nightmare, like the most nightmarish social

anxiety. Like, can I put on earrings today or are all the ladies going to be like, you know, is it too soon? Like, is it like, when is too soon or are they going to start talking like, when is she going to wear her necklace again? Like, oh oh my god my anxiety. I can't I feel like in that moment You just bring earrings and when suss out the vibe good idea See if you can put them on good I mean or may just hold your ear and just wait to see what they think and then like just kind of slip them

Right out like you say yeah, just be like oh too shiny. Okay, so far It looks like I'm constantly in deep morning I guess if I'm 90% of the time wearing a black t-shirt, black joggers and black socks. Maybe we're always in half morning. Maybe that's just our current status of life. It may be, yeah. So, okay, so ordinary morning, you're allowed to start incorporating some accessories,

and then half morning is you're allowed to have accessories. They can't be too flashy, but also your clothing starts lightening up, so you can wear grays, purples, and monotone colors. Oh, huzzah. Black, white, neutral. so you can wear grays, purples, and monotone colors. So black, white. Oh, huzzah. Black, white, neutral. I get to wear gray again, yay.

I know. So this is representing that you're gradually bringing color back to your life and those who could not afford brand new attire to mourn. Can you imagine, first of all, someone you love dying and now you have to go fucking shopping and it's not even a fun shopping spree. You have to just go buy all dark shit. Well, and at that time too, you had to be like measured

and there were all these pins. Like it's not even, I mean, of course, if you were like upper class or whatever. And you have to be super rich to have like a massive closet of clothes. Exactly. So people who could not afford all new attire would end up dying some of their existing clothes black.

I was gonna say would end up dying. I was like, why? Okay, dying their clothes. Just to avoid the fashion faux pas. Yeah, me too. I get it. I mean, honestly, if I couldn't afford it, I would just stay inside star fishing naked on the bed crime. Exactly.

So it actually works out. Nobody needs to know. So that's the clothing situation. The time spent in each morning period depended on how close you were with the deceased or your actual relationship like kinship to them. So if you were a parent or child, if your parent or child died, it was expected at least a year of, of, I think even deep morning was one year. If it was a grandparent or grandchild, it was six to nine months. I guess if you didn't really like them, you could just do six.

It's fine. And then my aunt asked after this weekend, it was six months. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's already out of mourning. It's fine. Yeah. She's like, oh, well, you know, it's been an hour. And if it's your sibling, if they passed away, it's only expected to do six months.

So and I guess if it's your friend, you just don't even try. So anyway, a widow. I know. Oh, if you're a widow, you could be expected even try. So anyway, a widow, I know. If you're a widow, you could be expected to be in full mourning for at least a year. It was really, if you were trying to prove your commitment or your loyalty to the marriage, then it was up to two and a half years.

A lot of people- But you gotta get remarried, right? At that time, it's like- Isn't that funny? Hurry up the process. Yeah, it's like I'm in a dark black veil and hopefully that attracts all my suitors who are willing to wait three years. Yeah, right's like I'm in a dark black veil and hopefully that attracts all my suitors who are willing to wait three years.

Yeah, right. They just come buzzing on by. And hopefully the person who died that I'm mourning had enough money left over that I can live off that until I can marry again. 100%. Imagine the people who got like shit talked about them behind their back because they just needed to get married to fucking eat, you know? Yeah, to be like, this is just a survival mechanism at this point.

I got married because he left me no money, and yet I'm the asshole because I'm not wearing black. OK. Well, you're an asshole because you're poor, I think, is what they would say. Yeah. Oh, yes, of course. Of course.

Poor. And then they would be like, you should probably die instead of mourning in your black dress. Not much has changed. So it feels like Queen, oh, apparently if you are really committing to the bit and you're like, I'm never marrying again, you're expected to mourn,

deep mourn for the rest of your life. Apparently- So you either get married or you're just fucking sad forever? If you decided you never wanted to marry again, if you like, I guess we're in a place where you could do that. A lot of women at the time, it wasn't like expected, but if they wanted to prove that they were more pious

and moral than anybody else, they would be seen in full black for the rest of their life because it emulated Queen Victoria who did that when her husband died. Oh, oh my God. Widowers on the other hand, they only had to mourn for up to six months. Plus because they already wore basically only black suits,

their dress never really changed. So they didn't have to go through all this rigmarole of like guessing what to wear. And children, which I thought this was lovely, children are not expected to wear any black, but maybe have a dark accessory if you wanted them to be involved in the ritual of mourning. But the depressing clothes they thought

might affect the development of the child But the depressing clothes they thought might affect the development of the child and didn't want to darken their spirits. And they're like, women, put this on, but don't affect the children with all of your gloom. Bad for them. Eventually people did realize that this was probably the case for adults too, which is why reform started against these practices of like forcing yourself to be in a depressive state. And by World War I, these practices were pretty much gone just in time for World War I where everyone was dying. Yowch.

They're like, we're all gonna be in mourning. Let's just ease up on all the new clothes. It's like now that we're all the same and everyone's dying, I don't know how much we have to do this. So anyway, that is my deep judge. It's not special like it used to be. It's not the same as when this was an exclusive club. What was me?

I don't look special grieving anymore. So anyway, that is my deep dive on that. And okay, so then 1875, the pierces move in, his wife immediately dies, now she's him and his adult son, Frank, and one toilet. And so then the manor immediately becomes the social hub for artists, politicians, and businessmen. I don't know how good he was at manufacturing furniture,

but within 10 years of living there, like the president was visiting this house. Okay. So Chair City, must be his name. Chair City is making moves. So President Coolidge lived there, PT, or not lived there, sorry, President Coolidge visited, PT Barnum visited, Norman Rockwell visited. And only 13 years into moving into this house and having all this success with the house,

then Sylvester dies. He remarried a woman named Ellen after his wife died, who was 30 years younger than him. Whoa. And they had two other sons. So after Sylvester dies, his wife gets the inheritance, and apparently his adult son Frank hated that and was like, I was here before you bitch. And so he decided that he was going to take custody

of his brothers to try to steal their share of the estate Drama drama and chair city little drama Right here in chair city with a capital D and that starts with D and that's fun for me Back to the drawing board drawing room. Nope. Okay, nevermind. I don't know what I was trying to do there. Well, thanks for ruining my nice music band shout out. It sounded like it ended. You're welcome.

Anyway, here we go. After it became Chairs City, you know, hot to trot drama, Frank, I guess, ended up not winning custody of his sons, but for years there was this like very local, well-known, like legal battle about who deserved the estate. Ellen dies, Frank moves out, one of the older sons moves out, and then the youngest son, Edward, is responsible for this building. Eventually the family fortune starts dwindling, and that's probably because of the Great Depression.

At one point they tried to convert it into the Victorian Inn. And then from there it became a boarding house. It was still dwindling financially, and eventually Edward couldn't take care of it. So his friend decided to take ownership of it. And the rumor is like Edward just lost it in a card game. I don't know if that's true. But his friend said,

I'll take responsibility and ownership of this place. You can still live there, but I'm gonna deal with like the renovations and stuff. Nice deal for Edward. So Edward spent the rest of his life there. He was the last person to die there. In total, there was like, oh no, he was the second to last person to die there.

Up until this point though, every single person who has died was a member of the family in the house. While he was living there, his friend spent over $100,000 renovating it. And for some reason, I'm assuming ghosts because this is a ghost story, but there's nothing to prove that. But for some reason, the friend ended up moving away and left the house completely abandoned for 20 years. Oh. This is after Edward died. So maybe after Edward died he started haunting his friend. I don't know. and the friend ended up moving away and left the house completely abandoned for 20 years. Oh.

This is after Edward died. So maybe after Edward died, he started haunting his friend. I don't know. Well, maybe he just was like in mourning and they were like, you're a man. You shouldn't be in mourning. And he's like, leave me alone. Let me run away.

So the place was abandoned for 20 years after being fully renovated. And then by the time it got repurchased, it had to be renovated again, re-renovated. Because- Re-renovated, okay. Because it now had been so dilapidated of just sitting there.

Oh, after spending all that money too, oh God. I know. That hurts. So in 2000, we really skyrocketed into the years here. Wait a minute. In 2000, a new couple purchases it, but it was once again, again, in poor condition, it had to be renovated for a second time.

They renovate it, but I'm assuming the renovations are what caused this, that like it was just a lot on the marriage. They ended up getting divorced and by 2006, they've moved out. Oh no. Okay. So now it's been renovated twice and barely anyone's even fucking lived there in like a quarter of a century. Two years later in 2008, Lillian and Edwin, our main characters decided to move in.

And they decided to move in because- Well, their names are Lillian and Edwin. Like who else is gonna move in here? It's a perfect couple. It is a little old timey names. They'd be on the list right under Sylvester maybe. Yeah. So Lillian and Edwin decide to move in.

I don't think they actually had plans of like getting a house or if they did, it was not this type of house, but Lillian saw it and immediately was weirdly fucking fixated on this house. Oh gosh, that happens. I feel like I hear about that. It was not in character for her. This is not what she's usually like, but she had a feeling that this thing was meant for them. She couldn't stop thinking about it.

Meanwhile, Edwin, Mr. Responsible is like, hang on a second, I'm looking at the numbers here and I don't think we can afford this. But Lillian is like so into it that he's like, okay, I guess we can do this. And he thought it was especially odd because she was a caregiver, I think, a caregiver for her mom.

And this place was like an hour away. And he was like, why do you wanna move away from everything and everyone? Like very odd. But so, but she was so committed to it that he was like, okay, I guess we can at least go on a tour of this place. So the night before the tour, he has this really freaky dream that he's floating

out front of the front doors of the house, floats into the building, and he sees an 1800s party going on. Ooh! He's floating around, nobody notices him except for... There's a celery vase here. There's a celery vase there. You got your celery, you got your vases.

And he's floating around, nobody's noticing him except for one man notices him in the crowd. And greets him, says hello, and then Edwin wakes up. Eww! He's like, welcome. Yes, it's like, oh, it's the beginning of the end. You're the guest of honor. Yes, the man was in black,

can't tell you if he was mourning or not. And they think it was Sylvester because Edwin said he got the vibe this was the master of the house. And I know. So then the next day he wakes up and they go on this tour and they realize, or Edwin realizes these are the exact doors

I was floating in front of. Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew. He goes into the room where he saw the party. He had never seen pictures of this place before. He was like, I don't, I have been, I was literally here last night and he can even see the spot where the man must shake you to your core. You know, especially if you're like not a spiritual person, that must be just like shocking to your system. It's moments like this where I'm like fucking read the room. Like if that happened to me, like that's the first of, of many red flags, but that's the

only red flag I need. I'm like, ah. But then people like me are like, maybe that means I'm destined to live here. Like it's just, yeah. I feel like people, I could spin that the wrong way. It'd be at this moment where I'd be like, Alison, this is, we've been working up to this moment where I need you to trust me on one, on one statement. Please, look me in the eye. We are not living here. We're not living here. Don't ask me a question. We're not living here. But anyway, Edwin didn't have ask me a question. We're not living here.

But anyway, Edwin didn't have that conversation with Lillian and they are still on this tour. He's realizing he knows this house because he just dreamt it. And on the tour, the people are even saying, hey, don't take pictures. Don't take pictures while you're here. Which also goes to show that during previous tours, no pictures have been taken. So Edwin couldn't have seen these rooms. But they're like, no pictures, don't take pictures. Weird. They approach a set of doors, again, doors that Edwin had seen. And this starts to really freak Edwin out.

Despite this, Lillian is like beyond enamored with the house. They, and he kind of thinks, okay, it's weird that I had this dream, but whatever. Like, she really cares about this house. Let's just get it. I don't know how we're going to afford it, but we're going to do some work on it and then move in the spring. So the first chunk of the story is them just working on the house while not even living there.

Okay. So, funny enough, as soon as they buy this house, Lillian's sister says, oh, here's a video I just saw of a team of ghost hunters here. Um... Which I kind of wonder if it was an episode of Ghost Adventures. And then the Indian sister says, oh, here's a video I just saw of a team of ghost hunters here. Which I kind of wonder if it was an episode of Ghost Adventures. Now that would be quite a welcome home, a housewarming gift from your sister.

Maybe he actually just dreamt of Zach. He just heard it like, you know, when you're sleeping and you can hear a TV program. Oh my gosh, you're right. The dream was just Zach Bagans going, welcome to hell. Yes, it's The dream was just Zach Bagans going, welcome to hell. Yes, it's like that new VR Zach Bagans thing that we're inventing where you get to put on a thing

and you're like in the eyes of Zach Bagans. It's pretty cool actually. Oh, I love how your sleepy brain works. You're just punching, punching the ghosts. Can I tell you something really bad? Always. I punched my cousin in the face this weekend. No, why are you?

I can't imagine why. My relatives don't want me staying with them anymore. Why would you? Wait, what happened? Tell me everything. Like a clean clocked him in the face as hard as I could. Wow. Did it feel good?

I'm not supposed to ask that. Maybe it felt a little good. Yeah, what was happening? Did he deserve it? Probably. Okay, I'm just going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say,

I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say, I'm going that not, I'm not supposed to ask that. It felt, maybe it felt a little good. Yeah, what was happening? Did he deserve it? Probably. Okay, I'm just going to say I don't remember. I was sleeping. Oh, okay. Well, that all beds are off. But apparently, I woke up enough that we made eye contact and I still did it.

And then I went back to sleep. Did he scare you? He thought it would be funny to wake me up by tickling me in the armpits. Incorrect. Okay, so like, obviously he deserved, I mean, I would have punched him so hard, his nose would have broken. He has little brother energy,

he still likes to like poke me in the ribs in the armpit and try to tickle me. Absolutely not, absolutely not. And apparently he got me right in the arm at the wrong moment. And your literal worst fear is someone touching your armpits while you sleep.

I don't understand. Apparently our eyes connected and I looked him into his soul as I absolutely wrecked his shit apparently. Target recognized. I mean, I don't blame you for one. It was my sleeper agent code had been realized. Like I just came to. The buttons in your armpits.

Yeah, I do not think you were in the wrong, sorry. He woke me up or the, he didn't, well, he apparently woke me up for a second. I went right back to bed too. So apparently I didn't. Oh good, it wasn't that. I had no guilt about it. Honestly, if you're being a little brother energy

to a full grown adult who's sleeping, what do you think is gonna happen? I just feel bad as I think it's one of the only times I've ever punched somebody, but apparently I got him real good. Like it's, anyway. Sorry. I know him.

For people who are like, what the fuck Christine? I know him and he does give little brother energy. So as someone with a little brother, I get it. I will say he never touched my armpits again for the entire weekend. Exactly. It's called protecting your space, your property. Yeah, yeah.

Anyway, sorry, you brought up punching, and I was like, oh, that's why I feel a little like shit today. Well, actually, the strangest thing happened. You've really lifted my spirits. So I feel that maybe you've given me some of your life force. Thank you for that. Tanner, this was for Christine, actually.

Tanner, thank you for your service. Yeah, I appreciate it. I feel a lot better. So, okay, so her sister sees this ghost hunting show. We don't know which one it was. I'm assuming Ghost Adventures. And then she goes, uh-oh, apparently this place really is haunted. But she doesn't believe in ghosts, so she doesn't even give a shit. She doesn't believe in ghosts.

She just thinks it's a fun fact, like, uh-huh, that's weird. Apparently so. Meanwhile, in a bookstore, Edwin finds a book about their fucking house and sees a chapter of it in a haunted house book. And in the book, it says that the second floor is haunted by a man who just casually, spontaneously combusts. Like in spirit form.

I hope so. Oh, okay. I don't know why I thought like, oh, does it like cause other people to spontaneously combust but like the ghost itself does. I see. No, the ghost itself combusts. That's weird.

Okay. He was like, hmm, that's enough for me to call the realtor and be like, why did you warn us? Yeah. And the realtor said, oh yeah, actually the no photos rule was because so many investigators

pretend to be prospective buyers so they can get access and take pictures of the building. That's actually so smart. Yeah, I know. Yeah, that's actually so smart. I'm not gonna lie. I don't want to give anyone props, but that actually is a sly move. It's not a bad idea. Yeah, yeah. Oh, oh, that got me. Good job. So after the confirmation that this place is haunted, Edwin iswin Is like yep can't confirm because I've been feeling weird shit around this house Anyway, the main bedroom and another room they call the copper room, which I guess is full of copper It said they both felt very unwelcoming and dark but the billiard room had a warm inviting atmosphere

I guess because that's where they socialized Where people socialize that's where the only only the men were allowed in probably. Yes, obviously. Yuck, if a woman's in a room, forget it. Forget it, gross. Bad vibes. Edwin began feeling extremely uneasy all over the house. Lillian couldn't have cared less because she was living in ghosts.

She's like, weee! She's like, but have you seen the window sills and the curtains and every little inch? So things start happening, and Edwin is the only one freaking out. One time Lillian found these like two decorative pieces of glass and she put them on the mantle on their house. And multiple times over they found them,

at least one of them lying in the middle of the room. And they're glass, so if it's falling off the mantle and rolling to the same spot, it should be shattering, first of all. Yes, I would think so, especially over and over again. Second of all, Edwin was like, okay, maybe the floor is uneven and it's just rolling off and it's going into the center of the house.

But every time he tried to replicate it, it wasn't happening. And you know, we've done that, where you just jump up and down over and over. Yes. Let's all knock it off. Yep, and it's not happening. So then he's having dinner, where you just jump up and down over and over. Yes. Let's all knock it off. Yep, and it's not happening. So then he's having dinner,

he hears a massive crash in the basement, and when he looks around, there's no cause of the sound, but they go back to dinner, and all of a sudden this three foot long, big ass metal planter slides across the entire floor. Oh no. And still desperate for there to be a reason to that. He tried to like push it himself and see like,

maybe the floor is still slanted. He's not even strong enough. But it's three feet long and metal. Like it's not gonna slide by itself. And when he would try to do it, it was not sliding on its own. That's not good. After that dinner,

they then saw that this glass decorative piece was once again in the center of the room. Oh, gross. Still unfazed and unbelieving in ghosts, Lillian spent all of her time in this house, which feels a little like it's attached to her. Like she didn't really have a reason to ever leave, especially the basement, which she felt oddly drawn to. And in hindsight was constantly seeing shadow figures walking around in there. And you're like, that's the place for me. Yes.

Not the billiards room with the place for me. Yes. Not the billiards room with all the great energy. Nope. Just the one where everyone's walking around. The dank dark basement. Sure. One day the vacuum kept turning itself off when she was just trying to vacuum and it kept turning itself off. She was like, okay, if there are ghosts here, you need to fucking stop because I'm trying to clean. Like, respect that I'm trying to clean your goddamn mansion actually. Good point. And then the vacuum started working again.

Okay. And she was like, oh, that's funky, but, like, didn't take it as a real situation. What made her finally believe was that in the basement, the shadow figures, like, started to actually, they weren't just her eyes catching something weird. She felt like it was intentionally trying to move only when she was looking. Eww. OK, that's kind of worse, because like at least sometimes I feel like

there's a ghost in my house. Like I'm being watched, but I'm like, but I know if I look, it won't be there. You know, because it's like they don't want to be like, oh, they want me to look at them. It's horrifying. It's like they were only moving when she was looking directly at them. That's so gross. Yeah. Like it's like they were only moving when she was looking directly at them. Yeah, forget it. So forget about it. A year later, 2009. They've moved. They're moving in officially. And Lillian is totally cool with the idea of it being haunted.

She has accepted that ghost. They haven't even moved in yet. In my brain, I had to like do a little. I forgot they were still renovating this whole time. I would have just been the third family to renovate and leave at this point. Just buy. Honestly, I said earlier, like, that second couple, they moved in in 2000 and renovated and then got divorced. I wonder if it was, like, the renovation was hard on their marriage or the fucking ghosts.

I wonder if they were like, fuck this and just left. Yeah, it sounds like it was bad all around. Well, so now they're the third family to have renovated. They're now moving in. It's 2009. Lillian does not give a shit that it's haunted, although she accepts that it's haunted. Edwin is probably rocking back and forth in a corner somewhere.

Aw. And by the way, Lillian is now not mentioning things that are happening to her alone to not keep scaring Edwin because she needs him to also be down with this because they put a lot of money on this. Right, okay, yeah, it's too late to go back. So that's probably what Allison is doing in this house. She's like, I'm not saying a damn thing

because I don't want Em to think there's a good chair. Zip it. When moving in, the main bedroom was still being worked on so they slept in a different room that they called the Red Room. I don't know why it's called the Red Room. Sounds bad. I can guess it's red.

One of the next big signs for Edwin that this place was haunted was that the behavior of their dogs was obviously changing. Their dogs started growling at the dark. They would cwin started noticing that the dogs were freaking out like fucking crazy and decided to follow their eyeline of what they're looking at. And he saw a clear shadow person walking through the house. Like clear enough that you and I would have thought first it was an actual intruder.

Right, right. So that's bad news, bad news. He knew it was a real shadow because there was a radio out there with like a backlight on it and the shadow would walk in front of it and the light would go away. So it was standing in front of light. So it was taking the light. Like it was...

Okay. Like a full solid shadow figure. Edwin would see the same figure float by their bedroom every night for two weeks. Forget it. Lillian, unbothered. I love her. She's so fun. I would love to be as fucking carefree as this woman. She's just like whatever. I aspire to this level. Ksarasa. Yeah, I love that. Soon even the neighbors start noticing activity. Before Lillian gives a shit. Wait a minute.

They're already complaining. Can you imagine if Edwin starts conspiring with the neighbors to be like, can you convince this crazy wife of mine? Come on. Get her out of there. This really does feel like a warning for anyone who's in a relationship with someone who doesn't believe in spirits. It's like, this could happen to you. Look out.

Yeah. Look, that's a cue to both you and me, I think. This is our cry for help, Em. I already know who I am in this story and you know who you are. Yeah. Oh. I'm the adult son, Frank. That's who I am.

And so the neighbors start noticing activity because they start going up to Edwin and being like, oh man, your wife's dedication to getting this house done in the winter is crazy. We can see her through the window painting all the time. Ah! And then Edwin's like, it's been too cold to go into this house. No one's been in there. Absolutely not. But also, so like, are they also painting?

Like are the ghosts also renovating? And like, are they painting over your paint because your paint sucks? Yeah, is that why they keep pushing that glass decorative thing? They're like, this is so ugly. Like we're decorating, you know what I mean? Like maybe they're like, your style is so gauche.

You know, we're on it. Which does make, it does beg the question of like, if they can move things around or if they can like create hallucinations, don't you think that they for a second would like make the room like totally one color just to give you the inspiration? Just to be like, see?

Instead of like a paint chip, it's like, see what this could be? Or like, they can literally transport you into a dream of yesteryear. They can't give you a dream of what the room should look like. Great point. You know? You don't have to like so passive aggressively paint

when we're not looking. Yeah, when we're not looking. And it's like, do you see it once you paint or does it disappear like as a ghost, you know? But also, I'm like, maybe that vision he had of this like old party, maybe that was like, see what you could restore this beauty to. Maybe you wanna bring it back.

Look at the vibes, don't you love the vibes? Lack of a toilet, it's great. One toilet, 80 people here. Yeah, perfect, what could go wrong? So anyway, they're all saying, wow, she's doing a great job painting through the winter. And he was like, that's not happening. Then they said, oh, you never told us you had a son.

Ah! An adult son or a child son? You mean the grown man always in the bathroom? Yeah, who is that guy? He's obsessed with the toilet. But so they were like, oh, I didn't know you had a son. And he was like, what are you talking about? They said, oh, the little boy that's always running. We can see him through the windows.

He's always running from room to room like he's playing a game. No, absolutely not. I like that the game is running. Running from room to room like okay that's fun question mark. Like clearly an only child. Oh oh. And so and he was like not only that but the lights are always turning on and off so we assumed that some people were at least coming in and out of the house while you weren't really we thought you were here. And not only was there no sun the light shouldn't have been going off and there was nobody painting, but when Edwin went to go look at the rooms

that this little boy was apparently running through, there's a wall now in between those rooms. Oh, intriguing. Mm-hmm. Uh-huh. On top of that, Lillian and Edwin are now starting to hear someone playing on their piano at night.

They can smell something burning in their bedroom. Oh my. Suggestions of spontaneous combustion. Interesting, yeah. And Edwin would hear a woman singing at night, which ironically would wake him up and then lull him back to sleep. So it was doing both things.

It's like when you get your armpits tickled. Yeah, like what in the fuck? Wakes you up and lulls you right back to sleep. It's like, which of these doits tickled. Yeah, like what in the fuck? Wakes you up and walls you right back to sleep. It's like, which of these do you want? Yeah. And he's having covers yanked off of him while he sleeps. That, I think, honestly, would be my line anywhere. I absolutely agree.

It's one thing to have something... It's because it's touch, and it's like two senses are being at the same time. Like, you could see it happening, and you can feel it happening. It's very vulnerable. I think I would just be so pissed off. I would be like, because it's like I'm trying to sleep

and like that will wake you up. No, it's like, to me, I think that's like probably the most like actually disturbing. I would run, like a cartoon, I would run out of the house if someone pulled the covers. That would be the most distressing, yeah. I agree. There's something about,

first of all, not respecting physical boundaries, but also when I'm in a very intimate state of being not on guard, horizontal, under a blanket where, mentally, since childhood, I've told myself that's where I'm safe. It's safe, yeah. Every inch of it feels so gross. No, you're 100% right. It's bad, it's bad.

So they're pulling the covers off. They're waking them up and lulling them to sleep. The doors are slamming so loud that the house is shaking. Edwin's discomfort is growing. And eventually he starts seeing a dark shadow swooping towards him, morphing into a man. What? And one day he actually looks down the hall

and he sees a man in flannel with dark circles under his eyes and then vanish out of nowhere. And it freaks Edwin out so much. Sorry, I've got like a little nose hit, it's freaking me out. If you're watching the YouTube and I just constantly look like I'm picking my nose.

I mean, I just keep muting myself to blow my nose. So I think whatever you do is not a problem. Something's happening. Anyway, sorry for interrupting. Let me say that again. His discomfort is growing day by day. He's seeing a dark shadow that morphs into a man. Then down the hallway, he's seeing a man

that is dressed in flannel, has dark circles under his eyes, and he vanishes. Edwin is so freaked out by this that he needs to like go get some air. So he leaves the house and walks across the street to, I guess like a diner or a gas station or something with like some food to grab. And there's ambulances outside. So he talks to the owner. He's like, what happened here? And he said, Oh, that man right there.

He just had a heart attack and died. And it happened at the exact same moment that he saw a man appear in his house, stare him down and then vanish. Oh my God, wait, but was it the same man or was it like a different man just kind of? I assume it was the same man. Oh my God, oh, ew. Based on the way that the story is told.

So it's almost like this is like the, he died and then like got like transported into this haunted house for a moment. It's like he found like the most energy magnetic. Yes, like a gateway type thing. Yeah, ew, ew, ew. Things are also happening to Lillian. Again, she's keeping them from Edwin.

And they begin researching the Pierce Manor and find at least five confirmed deaths, somewhere probably closer to seven. Because Sylvester, his two wives, a daughter-in-law and a granddaughter all died in the house. Eventually Edward died in the house. Oh no. And a renter when it became a boarding house.

He also died of smoke inhalation because they think he fell asleep with a lit cigarette on his chest. Oh my God. He died that way. There's also rumors, there were some sources I looked at and they even mentioned it kind of in the TV shows I watched. They kind of mentioned, but there's no solid confirmation that during the 1930s and it was the Great Depression and the youngest son was

in charge of it and he was trying to keep up with it financially, there's rumors that after his family died in the house, he just turned it into like a gambling hall and a brothel. And if that's true, allegedly one of the sex workers also died in the house. Oh, interesting. Okay. But we don't know for sure. So Edwin and Lillian suspected that the man they keep seeing in the office is also the source

of the burning smell and must be the renter who died of smoke inhalation. Jesus. Well, and like the fact that that aligns so perfectly with a ghost spontaneously combusting. Oh, forget it. Soon it's now getting colder because it's getting further into winter and the couple is using certain stoves to heat the rooms because the old fireplaces are unusable in today's world. So they were using certain stoves to heat certain rooms and other rooms were just running cold. In one of these warm rooms, Edwin wakes up to Lillian humming and she's dressed nicely, which is odd considering her usual routine of not leaving the house.

Not dressing nicely. That's really nice as a husband. If Alvin saw me dressed nicely though, she would be like, where are you going? Like what happened? Who died? Like if Blaze saw you in a dress, he'd be like, girl, what's happening?

He'd be like, did I forget something? Yes, yes, truly. He probably did have a panic like that. So anyway, he is like, okay, that's weird. She's in a really good mood. She's dressed up. And he assumed that she was going out for the day and just kind of left it at that. Yeah. So anyway, he is like, OK, that's weird. She's in a really good mood. She's dressed up. And he assumed that she was going out for the day and just kind of left it at that. Or like had errands to run or was meeting a friend. He she didn't seem to mind that it that the room she was walking through

that day were the really cold ones that didn't have any heat. Oh, so he was like, that's kind of weird. And then he even said, where are you going? And she didn't talk to him. She didn't respond. So then Edmund's like, okay, she's humming happily. She's not responding to me. She's dressing out of character.

She's going into the colder rooms. Like she's- So creepy. Feels creepy. Anyway, she leaves and he's like, be done with that. Okay, go do whatever you were gonna do. You're freaking out. Be gone. While he's doing his own work around the. Okay, go do whatever you were gonna do. You're freaking out. Be gone.

While he's doing his own work around the house, he assumes that she'd been gone for hours, but then later goes and sees that her car never left the driveway. And so he starts looking for her around the house and finds her in the basement digging. Ah, shut the, in her fucking nice dress? Forget it.

She had been digging all day, her clothes are filthy. And when he tried to stop her, she screams at him, just leave me alone and let me finish. I, no, absolutely not. Homegirl finds a pelvic bone. They take it to the cops, it's discovered that it's not human, it's animal. But Lillian is somehow disappointed

because she then says later, she thought that the boy that everyone had been seeing and like all the neighbors had been seeing in the windows, she thought the boy was trying to talk to her or had communicated to her some way that he was murdered and buried in the house. Oh dear. And she felt that he was giving her signs to find him. Oh dear. And she felt that he was giving her signs to find him.

Oh dear. Then, we never hear about those previous neighbors ever again who saw the boy in the window. But, new neighbors move in. And immediately, the mom of the house, the mom of the new family, says, oh, my son keeps wondering when your son's going to come downstairs and play with him.

Oh no. Because my son keeps seeing the boy up in your window looking down at him. And apparently this boy is somehow telepathically telling this son who lives across the way, oh, come upstairs, I want to play with you, let's play. And so the mom is like, I think the mom assumed that this kid had come downstairs

at some point, she was like, oh yeah, he tells my son all the time to come play with him. Oh my God, if kids only knew what they were saying to us. Then they wouldn't tell us. Then they would not tell us. So then Edwin even talked to the new neighborhood boy who confirmed that there was a little boy there upstairs who kept also telling him,

not only can you come over and play, but there's a big hallway for us to run in. Imagine talking to that kid and being like, now are you sure it's this house? Right, right, right. Could it possibly be 705? And also like- Could it possibly be 216? And also the hallway you can run in.

Imagine if you got to the house thinking, I'm going to run through this big ass fucking hallway. And then there's a wall in the middle of it. It's like, well, this isn't as fun as it was promised to me. The fucking other boy, well, but then the other boy runs through the wall and you're like, this kid's fucking cool. You know, you're like, oh shit, teach me how to do that.

It's like, he's Harry Pottering this fucking thing. Yeah, this is amazing. So at this point, now the activity in the house is even more undeniable. The window screens will blow themselves in with no wind. Dishes are falling all the time. Doors are opening and closing. Children's footsteps are in the attic.

Sometimes the footsteps would run all the way downstairs to the bedroom and then go silent as if it stops right at the room. Absolutely not. I beg to differ. At that point, just keep running in. Like, it's like, where did you go? You might as well. One night, the dogs were fixated on something

on the top of the stairs, and Lillian said, all right, look, apparently there's ghosts here. Like, if you really want to talk to us, just come out and say something. Like, you're bothering the dogs. If you really want to be here, just do something about it. They own up to it, right. And what she heard back was,

apparently the most insane demonic roar you've ever heard. Uh oh! You hate to hear that. You hate to hear a portal open like that. Uh oh! You hate to invite that into your home by mistake. Oh shit. Whoopsie daisies.

So Edwin is like, hey, fuck that. Oh, fuck that big time. All the way down. And said, how about I, it's 2009. It's the height of Facebook.com. Oh wow. You mean the Facebook.com. Yeah.

The Facebook, yeah. The book of faces. And I'm gonna create me a little Facebook page. And it's gonna be about this house. And I'm gonna ask for any information that anyone has in this house, because what on earth is going on here? I see, I see.

Paranormal investigators fly to this Facebook page. And curious neighbors are now like, I'm sure making it worse with the game of telephone. And basically his inbox is flooded with not only information, but requests to tour it or investigate. Oh. So Edwin begins entertaining investigative teams

coming through on overnight stays, which I think is so fun because he was doing it, like he, I guess, ghost hunting overnight stays maybe wasn't as popular as it is today. So there wasn't like a real etiquette towards it, but he would just stay in the house while they were there. So he would just be like, well, I'm going in for the night

and just go upstairs and go to sleep. Oh, keep it down, boys. Yeah. He would just hit the hay and let them do whatever they wanted. And he would charge people, and the fees would go to renovating the house. So he thought he was doing a, you know,

it was all working out. Lillian, however, she was like, well, I don't like these strangers coming in and out of our house. And I'm like, fair girl, but also all of your opinions so far are not landing. Like, so far, if it were up to you, we should stay in this house and not do anything about these ghosts.

Like, you were disappointed there weren't human bones in the basement. I think we don't trust your judgment anymore. Like, I get, in hindsight and as a third party, I understand she was just being affected differently by this house, but if I were Edwin, I'd be like, what is going on with my fucking wife? Like I-

Get a grip, girlfriend. It's like, if this can help us at all, maybe these people could come in and get rid of them. Exactly. You know? So I, but I also understand, I don't want strangers in our house while we're sleeping. They can fucking rob us.

To be fair, I don't ever want strangers in my house, so I get it on that note alone, yeah. But at the same time, I think Edwin was like, let me just try to fucking fix this. So yeah And you know, I got to give Lillian some credit. She was like, I don't know about these strangers They could be up to some shady shit and a lot of the investigators were not considered of the fact that this was somebody's fucking House, let alone probably a historical landmark. If not, it should be Stunning like you and me It's like when they send those waivers and we read them

and we're like, wow, like, it's so sad they have to write all this in here. Like don't break the light fixtures and don't like touch this or that and don't go into the locked rooms. People want to steal things, like, you know, at the Whaley house or at the Queen Mary, people want to take something.

Oh, Jesus. The amount of times that in the stateroom B340, is that the most haunted room? Yeah. The plaque for like the room door plaque keeps getting stolen, so they just had to stop putting a plaque up. They don't even label it anymore. Yeah.

Yeah. So if you want to know what room it is, it's the room without a fucking label. Yeah, there you go. Which works just as good. Anyway, so she was right that some of the investigators were like, not totally, well, somewhere up to some shady shit, some of them were just disrespectful.

Like one of them straight up clogged their toilets. Like Frank would be pissed. You know he came back from the dead just for that. He was like, I had another thing, not in toilet town I say. So Edwin caught, actually, this is like probably the shadiest thing that happened, is he woke up from like a deep sleep one night

and just felt like something was off and went downstairs and saw the investigators stealing historical documents from their basement. That's crazy. What is wrong? Like people just can't get a grip, you know? But anyway, so Lillian was not down with this, but she could see that the events that he was hosting gave Edwin something to

control finally about this house and look forward to, and also probably having more people in the house made him feel safer in some way. Like it just said the power of numbers. Like if I were in a haunted house and there was 20 of us, I'd feel a lot less haunted or threatened by ghosts than just me. Yeah. So she let them continue,

but the more people that investigated, the more active the hauntings became because they were stirring shit up. So now the house is, there's more growling throughout the house. They're getting EVPs with strange commands, like look under the bed. Oh no, that's no. That's... No.

Something is touching people's hands and faces and necks. Things are following people home, which, like, honestly, good. It's now out of my house, you know? Like... Yeah, take it with you. If someone was coming into my house to talk to the ghosts that were scary,

and now they're leaving with those ghosts, like, I'm not gonna say a single thing about that. Yeah. Take them with you. One woman who was visiting actually got pushed down the stairs and then caught by something else, which like, where there's like, she was the monkey in the middle. I was going to say they're playing Monkey in the Middle. There was also a little...

I do. What? I deleted you off the screen by accident. I got too excited about Monkey in the Middle. You're back. There was also a little girl who was now being seen in the hallways greeting people. Oh, she's like, hi, I've been hired as the guest liaison. Like, what are you doing?

They think that she might have been the granddaughter of the pierces who died in the home. So, and she's just saying hi to people. Okay. Some psychics were now coming through, psychics and mediums, and they said that they saw a woman who was strangled to death in one of the bedrooms. Oh no. Which probably led, came from that brothel story. Yeah.

One of the rooms, it was one of the rooms where women felt most uncomfortable, go figure. They also sensed two dark entities in the basement. The young boy, everyone was saying, allegedly was drowned in the basement cistern. Oh my god. And a psychic also told Edwin that one ghost named Maddie, who used to be, she used to look over the Pierce children, she used to work there in the house. Apparently Maddie is the one who woke him up in the middle of the night to catch the guys and rescue the documents.

Oh, wow. Now that's interesting. Another investigator actually said that they got attacked multiple times in that house and got scratched in the shape of the Roman numeral four. And he actually is like the fourth of his name. That's kind of weird. That's icky, that's really icky. Right after he got scratched, the ovulus said, squeeze every throat.

Oh, that's horrible. Our ovulus always says orchard. Apple, it's always apple and orchard. Like, we're ovulus always says orchard. Apple. It's always apple and orchard. Like fucking. We're not on an apple orchard for the millionth time machine. Like I, yeah.

I never know what to do with it. We've never used the ovulus and not gotten the word apple at some fucking point or orchard. Then I'm like, is that, are we supposed to take note of that? I don't know. I'm like, have we been on an orchard every single time

and we just don't know it? Yeah. In the middle of the ocean on the Queen Mary. Yeah, right, exactly. Is this the place of an apple orchard? I do wonder, what if the machine is haunted by some like apple orchard farmsman? That's not a word.

An apple farmer, a tree man. Yeah, a farmsman, like I said. An orchard's man. Are you okay, Christine? No. So, the same investigator who mentioned Maddie, the ghost who used to watch over the kids, apparently she's still there managing this entire fucking house, trying to take care of all of the other spirits in there.

And Maddie has only stepped forward to talk to the psychics to let investigators know that she is losing control of the spirits. Uh-oh. Because she had control of what was currently in the house. But now with all these new investigators bringing things in, there's like a whole new group of people. People are coming in and out.

And she can't do her part on her end. And so now it's coming into our world and affecting us. Oh, no. Not again. Which, if Maddie was that astute and, like, well-spoken, amazing, but this also kind of sounds like maybe something a psychic got pieces of and built a story on. And built a narrative, yeah. It seems like a lot of words.

Or it sounds like someone could have just said, Maddie on the ovulus, and then Zach went, is this the caretaker of the home? Who decided that the entire portal is damaged? And is now losing control of all of the spirits? Wait, what is it, Zach? Do you know that? What's happening?

He loves determining things. He loves to read in between the lines. So anyway, that's the story that like Maddie was saying, like you gotta stop bringing these investigators in because I'm losing control on my end. So you're losing control on your end. Which like if Maddie was here all along, then why were people getting freaked out from the beginning?

But okay, before investigators got there, shouldn't you have had a rein on the people who were like spontaneously composting? Well, okay, yeah, that's a little out of control. Maybe she just had some that she was like, I can't like, yeah, she was like, that guy I just don't deal with that guy. Just over. You gotta just deal with on your own. Um, anyway, that's the story we're going with during one investigation. Um, despite being told, stop doing investigations, even mediums and psychics coming on investigations

were saying, stop doing investigations during one final investigation, a psychic and Lillian at the same time fainted. Um, and then Lillian didn't wake up for three days. What? And when she came to, she asked Edwin, why haven't you tried to fucking wake me up or feed me or see if I need to go to the bathroom or call a hospital? And he also couldn't remember the last three days. He had been in a total trance. Wait, she was in the house this whole time?

For three days. Oh, I thought like for sure in a hospital at least. No, she fainted and then they just, he just brought her, carried her to bed and she just never woke up for three days. And for those same three days, he was in a trance and completely cannot remember anything about those three days or why he didn't panic. Sounds like a gas leak.

Yeah, right. Actually, that's a great point. That's scary. From those three days, the only thing he remembers is that every night he would see a woman in white floating upstairs and sobbing uncontrollably. He's like, I do remember one thing. You're not going to like it. It must have been the one who knows how to wake him up from a deep sleep while

he's, while sleeping or something. Yes, yes, yes. She has some sort of stranglehold on these people. Yeah. It's like he would just, she just lulled them to sleep for three days to like win a contest I guess. Forget it. So a psychic again, then sees a woman behind Lillian with her hand on Lillian's shoulder and takes this as an omen. And around this time is when Edwin and Lillian, maybe the shoulder thing happened first, but

the fainting thing and waking up was when they were ready to fucking leave. That was too far. Yeah. Got it. And they knew that the tour should probably stop too, but they were like, well, one, we can't afford the upkeep or the renovations without doing tours. And two, if we're not even gonna live here, it's not like we're putting ourselves in harm's way.

So let's just keep the tours going. I can understand that. However, Edwin, they're still looking for a way to get out of there. Edwin is getting angrier. Lillian one day, oh, this was the final straw. Lillian is one day lying in bed. She hasn't even gone to sleep yet,

but she just lies down and then realizes out of nowhere she's fully paralyzed and screams for Edwin. And the thing that she's screaming is, get her off of me. Oh. And obviously nobody's there. Oh my God.

Edwin is trying to like roll her or push her because Lillian is like, just get me, like just break me out of this. Like something's on me, just break this. And apparently it didn't, he couldn't do anything. He couldn't move or he couldn't roll her. It felt like there was somebody else on top of her. And only after like significant prayer

did it go away after a while. Oh no. This was their final straw and they moved in immediately with Lily and sister who I think like the day before close on her house. She was like, I closed on my house and they went, you were over there. Yep, guest room ready, all right.

While no longer, which by the way, she should have seen coming if she's going to show them videos of their haunted house. She's the one sending the video, exactly. Girl, come on. So while no longer living there, they continue the tours, including our favorite. Could this be?

Oh, Zachary comes. Zachary comes. Oh, but not on a tour for certain. He buys out the whole place. He buys out the whole place. But not enough to let them just finish out the renovations. Just enough of whatever he needed. Just enough. And so a whole bunch of people do tours. Eventually the city made

them stop doing tours. I don't know what the drama was there, but it sounds like there was beef between the psychics and then local investigators. And it sounds like the psychics got the place shut down out of spite. That's what it sounds like, which I'm more probably in chair city. Oh, my God. Chair city is fucking full of drama. I can't get enough. Uh, TLC, get on it. I know. In 2015, the building was sold to a Halloween haunted attraction company, of course.

But then I guess they don't do that anymore or maybe they share their time. What year was it? You said 2015. Okay. So I don't know if they still do. I think a lot of places like that closed during COVID too. Yeah. Right. Today they have reopened for history tours, but, but visitors trying to cleanse the house or talk to spirits is like totally forbidden. You get kicked off the team immediately. Wow. And tours do not include the basement because so many guides refused to go down

there. Okay. And then when Zachary went, he tried to tell a storyline that there was another person who lived there named Jay Stemmerman, but no sources I saw were talking about. But it's's so he, he like called a researcher who said, you should look into this guy. He sounds like a not so great guy who lived there. And then another researcher said,

Jay is what brought in the darkness, but then like refused to comment any further. And you can even see Zach get like upset about it. He was, she was like, I don't want to open that door. And Zach was like, we're here to open any further. And you can even see Zach get upset about it. She was like, I don't wanna open that door. And Zach was like, we're here to open the door. Let me open it. I punch it right open. Oh, he literally said, but we're here to open the door.

Oh my God. And she was like, no. And then it was immediately open. You know how distraught he was about that too. He was pissed, I'm sure. But so when they go in there, they did actually hear some pretty serious bangs that made no sense shuffling One of their cameras died. They heard a woman's voice something touched Aaron's shoulder

And then they got an EVP of a weird command saying go to sleep Yeah, and then thank you and then the spirit box got he's here When asked what their name was he got the name David? Which was the name they had heard earlier in their questioning. They said, do you remember Edwin? And they got a little girl saying hi, which sounded like a little girl greeting. Do you want us to leave the house?

The spirit box said no. Do you want us to sell the house? The spirit box said not sure. And then who was the woman who lived here? The spirit box said Lillian. Oh, that's interesting. And that is the, that's what I got for you on the- I think, wow, you, that's one of my favorite stories

you've ever done, I think. That was a good, that was a really good one. I was trying to do lightning round. It was double the set of notes that I usually do. And I was worried about time. So I was flying through it. Maybe that's what kept your attention. Maybe.

It was really well done. And honestly, that was one of the scarier ones I've heard from you in a long, like one of the ones that like actually got to me, which I feel like I've become somewhat jaded over the years, but that really freaked me out a bit. But anyway, yeah, there she is. Very well done.

Thank you, thank you. Now I'm doing something a little different today, Em. Uh oh. For the first time ever. Oh God. So we, you and I have both done this together as a planned episode, but I have never really done a whole episode topic

that's an update on a previous case. Like a recap slash update. Today, I am doing an extended plus updated version of Gypsy Rose Blanchard. I ought to kiss you on the mouth. Are you kidding me? Please don't. I'm very ill.

You're not going to feel good afterward. Okay. Brilliant. Brilliant. So, yeah. So, it felt timely, right? With Gypsy Rose getting out of prison in December and being all over social media. And of course, when we first covered this case in 2017, by the way, if you're wondering,

it was not, there was no... We barely had a podcast. It was episode 15. Like, we'd only been doing it for like a couple months. So this is your actual, like, this is really just fully well-done research now. I gotta tell you, maybe one of the reasons I had such a... fitful sleep was that before bed, I listened to episode 15 of our podcast.

You can't do that. It was a bad idea. I had to, because I was like, I have to know how I, but oh boy. People ask if we listen to our own podcast. And if I were to, I certainly wouldn't go. Not the old ones. I certainly wouldn't even touch those.

Back in my reading the Reddit days, people would be like, I'm trying to start and that's why I drink and I just can't get into it. And I'm like, I fucking get it. I don't understand. And then people would be like, start at episode 50 or like a hundred. I'm like, I get it.

I also wouldn't like it if I had to start at episode one. And to be fair, there's like the, My Brother, My Brother, Me podcast, they have six, 700 episodes now. And I remember when I first started listening, I started at episode one and everyone was like, that's a terrible idea. And then like, you know, you get,

you gotta go. You start at 250 and I was like, are you serious? But it's a complete shift. Like you can see years of like, they've just developed, you know, in numerous ways. So I just want to give a warning to everybody. Like you can listen to 15. It's like a little meh.

I mean, listen, it's funny. Like we're funny, I guess, but we sound different. Like our voices are completely different. And I know you know that too, because we've listened to a couple episodes recently for like research purposes. And we have these like radio voices. It's so troubling.

Radio voices. I hear myself sounding like... Like a newscaster? Almost insecure, like I'm putting on a voice, you know? Maybe we just weren't used to microphones in our face yet. No, I don't think we were, because we were presenting a paper almost. It just felt very like I was nervous or something. Also, again, podcasting was not what it is today.

I don't think we knew what we were supposed to sound like. No clue. We were just winging it. Yeah. So it's fun for that, like, a throwback, but I don't want anyone to be like, wow, I'm gonna, you know, rethink this podcast after this episode. I will say the first thing I did on the episode is I violated HIPAA. And so that's a good start for me.

I absolutely started talking about one of Blaze's patients and I was like, this is not a thing I'm supposed to be doing. And I think even in the episode, I was like, I don't know if I'm allowed to say this anyway. And it's like, what the fuck? I like how you're like, we sounded like official newscasters. I did not, I did not say that. I said, we sounded insecure, like we were putting on airs.

And that is exactly what we sounded like. Newscasters, farthest thing from it. Okay. I will also add that in the intro you were very homesick so I thought that was a fun little tidbit. Well that's very lovely. You said somebody at work had made, by the way we both were talking about being staying late in the office. LOL'm like, the office. Then you said somebody made, somebody called people with couches in their bedrooms tacky. And so then you got really upset and homesick

because of your home having a couch in the bedroom. I had two couches in my bedroom. Yeah. So that's extra tacky. No, kidding. No, no, certainly probably so. No, not for a kid. You know, it's like, people are stupid.

Okay, and then guess who got introduced? Classic Kevin for the first time. Oh, wow. He touched the chair in Thirsk, the haunted chair. And that was, I was like, oh, and then I told my story of the White Hand for the first time, Carl and the White Hand, and I listened back, and I was like, I missed like so many big things.

And then there was one quote I wanted to like just leave the leave this little recap with, which is you saying you literally say, Oh, it's actually really fitting today to you said, Bernardo Flaster scene is on my baby name list. And like it got me so good because I said there was one doctor named Bernardo Flaster scene. He said, Oh, yeah, that's on my baby name list. And it got me really good. And then today with all this talk of Sylvester, I thought it was a fitting little tribute. And also CK touching the chair when we're talking about Chair City. Oh, CK, it's working. Does the K stand for Keith or? Maybe the K stands for Kevin. Of course it stands for Kevin, Sylvester Kevin. No, that's actually, you know what?

That's what I mean, like we should have thought the K stands for Kevin, not Keith. What am I thinking? We're idiots, big, big dumb idiots. Nothing has changed. Anyway, it was embarrassing to listen to, but I think it would have been embarrassing no matter what we did or said,

because it's us, what, seven years ago? Well, I'm very happy that we're talking about Gypsy Rose today, because I have been wondering, I knew you were gonna, because at some point, she's all over the place. It needed it, yeah. It's almost like, I am not surprised you're doing it now, because I know a lot of times when things are sensationalized,

you wait for it to calm down so that we've got all the facts, and she has calmed down a bit. She has. It's sort of like, and I will also give major credit to Sersha for like keeping an eye out and being like, Hey, when's the right cause like we both had known or at least I had known I wanted to cover it for a while. I don't remember like the extent to which Sersha and I talked about it, but I remember them emailing me or messaging me on Slack and being like, I think it's the time, I think it's time.

And I was like, you're right, it's time. And so this is kind of an update because you're right, it kind of calmed down. I just Googled her to see what's going on. Just some pregnancy updates on Yahoo News, nothing too salacious. So I feel like it's a good time to take a little peek in the history. Shall we crack into it? Let's crack into it. Okay. Oh, Em, it's like the old times.

And you know what's so funny? We were like 10 minutes into our intro and you said, now we have been talking way too long, I'm not even gonna do Milkshake Facts today, we don't have time. And I was like, whoa, okay. And so we like wrapped up the intro and then at the end you were like, stop talking, we have to go.

And you were like, and that's why we drink. And I was like, wow, Emma's like fucking. I used to be more on the clock about it. You were time sensitive. You know what, it's because we had two jobs. I was like, I gotta get to bed. Now I just gap in there. We gotta stay late in the office tomorrow.

I was like, what? I was like, somebody's be mean about my couches or something. No, yeah, you needed to be bullied at work the next day. So I had to rein it in because I was obviously drinking. And then I go, oh, I'm drinking this Chardonnay. It's called Willow Tail or some shit. And I'm like, what am I talking about? I'm like, it's one of my favorites.

I'm like, what am I saying? I'm making, I don't even know what that is. I mean, maybe it was my favorite seven years ago, but. I will say just to give a full update all the way through, if I was talking about the office back then, if there was somebody I was ever complaining about, I'm sure there's other episodes where I, I'm taking my meds by the way.

If there was one person or prop master I was talking about back then who used to always bother me, well, there's a few of them. But I remember back then always having a problem with this one person. And I will tell you an update, they recently passed away. And so now I don't know how to feel about it. But if you listen back to me being particularly cruel about any few people, one of them might not be here anymore. Know that they're dead.

Thanks, Em. I just know that we saw that through and now I feel a little guilty about what I said. Now they're haunting Em for eternity. No, they, well, I don't know. Maybe. Whatever. You know, I'll text you about this later.

Okay. Oh, okay. Anyway, that's the update on my old prop life is that the person I did not like is no longer with us and I don't know how to feel about it. All right, Pete. And that's why I drink as I sit my album. So Gypsy Rose Blanchard and as Saoirse added, extended with new information and updates on her release. And if you have not listened to us cover the case on Gypsy Rose,

you do not have to. However, if you don't know the story at all, I would recommend listening to an episode or watching a docu-series or something about it because I do cover the story, but it's not quite as like maybe in-depth and like alarming as maybe, I mean, it's very alarming, obviously, but I think I'm telling the story now

with more of an insight into the actual case versus a full cover. I feel like I obviously know the story. I know the bare bones of it, but I actively don't watch anything true crime because I know eventually you might cover it. So if it hasn't been brought onto my TikTok algorithm, I don't know about it, which means I probably actually know the aftermath a lot better than the early part. You probably know more about Gypsy Rose than I do at this point.

I will say it was, I do feel bad and I want to apologize with a laugh. Like I want to apologize, but also laugh about it because I can so see now why you have this paranoia of like making a judgment call during my stories. And then, cause you were like, saying like, that guy should rot in hell or whatever. That it's like, I was clearly baiting you because you didn't know the story at all. So I was like telling the story of like, oh, they got, you know,

Dee Dee Blanchard was murdered. And you were like, who could do that to this woman? She's worked so hard. And it's just so funny cause I'm like, well, you just didn't know the story. And I set it up to be that way, like a shock twist ending. 400 episodes, I'm glad I'm finally validated. Yeah, no, I think you've been validated.

I think everyone kind of felt the energy shift of like, you're like, I'm not gonna fucking say anything until you tell me. I've learned to keep quiet, which I always feel bad about, but also it's like, first of all, what am I gonna joke about during, if I can't find a way to segue out of your story entirely to make a joke, I just don't make a joke.

And then I don't know anymore if you're pulling one on me, if you're sly. Ooh, no, I'm still. Okay. I'm still. Silly, for sure, yeah. You did make some, we did make some jokes that think looking back, we're not outrageously

inappropriate, but we're definitely in poor taste. I still think about when, well, I don't even wanna say it out loud. I still think about some jokes where I'm just like, oh, I can't believe I did that. I know, and even some that caught on, and I think all of us and our listeners have also kind of moved past a lot of it.

It's almost like we all were like, that's funny. And then like five years later, we're like, maybe not as funny as we thought five years ago. I think everyone's in the same boat. Like we're all kind of learning. Nothing cancelable, but still something I'm not proud of. Not something I'm proud of for sure. And it's like, and just comforted that it's episode 15

and genuinely like we didn't really know what we were doing. We're officially podcasting through the ages, which means we have grown through it from episode one. I like to think so. I like to think so. And so, is that, do you have a butler? Is that Allison or is that a butler? What just happened? What are you talking about? Well, what are you doing when you do this?

Oh, there's a shelf here. I'm putting my drink on a shelf. Oh my God, you keep looking and like almost smiling and it looks like you're just handing it off. And then when you got your... I'm just, I'm smiling, I think, because I'm just happy to not have to hold it anymore. When you were handed the pills, I was like, oh, somebody just handed them pills. And then you like, it looked like you handed it back to somebody and kind of like looked

at them. It does look exactly like... And then you said, and the reason I say butlers because while I was blowing my nose, everyone, fun fact, and was telling me that Alison has jury duty. And so I was like, wait a minute, do you have a butler? Am I like missing out on a huge update, life update? The only thing that's here is it's a shelf and there's,

okay, actually I was gonna complain. Imagine after episode 15 and now we have butlers. If someone heard like just started here and yeah No, I actually was gonna this was one of the reasons why I drink is because I went to sleepy hollow I'm dragged Tanner with me I was like I'm going to sleep your hollow on principle and I'm getting something that says sleepy hollow on it in Sleepy hollow because there is Terry town. Yes, I know technically they're kind of the same but I was like I need to go I bought you a bunch of shit.

I thought you weren't going back to Sleepy Hollow. So even I were like on a mission. Did you get me stuff? A bunch of shit. Thank God, because here's my story. We went to Sleepy Hollow and I had given the weekend to my aunt and on the, on my Monday, I was going to go with Tanner to Sleepy Hollow and do all the stuff. Sleepy Hollow is in fact quite sleepy and shuts down everything, everything.

And so the only store that was open that had anything with the word Sleepy Hollow on it was a bike store. So I got a water bottle that says Sleepy Hollow Bikes. Oh, don't worry. I've got you covered. I literally, I, that was all I could find. This is so comforting because I bought so many things because I wasn't sure which ones to give to you. So now you can have your pick.

Okay, but also I, and we're seeing each other next week. Am I seeing Leona next week? No. Are you sure? Yeah, cause they're in, well, no, maybe in New Hampshire though. Because I have a present for Leona and maybe we can do a swap where I get to.

She'll be in New Hampshire with us. Great, okay. Super duper. We'll do a present swap. Aw, she is not gonna like the swapping part where she has to use something. It'll be worth it, she'll like it. Okay, great.

So anyway, tell your butler to keep it down because I'm gonna cover Gypsy Rose's planchard. And I'm gonna give her a little recap. Some of it is exactly the same as what I talked about in episode 15. A lot of it is new. So let's just dive into it. Gypsy Rose, she was born on July 27th, 1991, which incidentally is a fact that she would not know for most of her life. Her father, Rod, was only 17 when he found out that his girlfriend, Claudine, who went by Dee Dee, was pregnant with Gypsy. And so he's 17. Dee Dee tells him she's only 21. However, she was actually 24. So she's already lying early, early on. Rod married Dee Dee because he's 17. He thinks that's the right thing to do.

She's pregnant. But then on his 18th birthday, he kind of gets cold feet. He's like, we're not getting married for the right reasons. This is a bad fit. So, you know, I don't, we don't really love each other. So they separated, but he wanted to insist on supporting Dee Dee through the pregnancy and supporting his future child.

So they separated and Dee Dee moved in with Gypsy to her parents' house and Rod actively remained involved in Gypsy's life, made child support payments, you know, would take her on trips, like very, tried to be as present as he could. When Gypsy was three months old, Dee Dee called Rod and told him that Gypsy had sleep apnea and often stopped breathing in her sleep, which I will say as a parent now, I do understand that anxiety because there's so much talk around SIDS and, you know, the correct way to sleep, sleep on your back, don't let them suffocate. There's so much scary, I don't want to say fear-mongering because it's a valid fear, but there's a lot of stress around that topic.

So I can imagine that that could be a big trigger for somebody with like health-related anxiety. And so she told Rod, hey, Gypsy has been stopping breathing in her sleep. She has sleep apnea and all of the tests, she did all these tests on baby Gypsy has been stopping breathing in her sleep. She has sleep apnea and all of the tests, she did all these tests on baby Gypsy, they all came back negative, but Dee Dee insisted that something was wrong. So as a result, because I guess that wasn't enough, she told people that Gypsy actually had a chromosomal genetic disorder. So think Down syndrome, trisomy 13 and 18. And, you know, DeeDee didn't

specify which chromosomal genetic disorder Gypsy had. And, you know, it is true that some people have genetic conditions that are so rare, they don't even have a proper name. But it just didn't seem quite right. Because it didn't seem as if DeeDee specifically discussed like this rare unknown condition. She was just more vague about it than anything and just said like, oh, it just causes all these issues rather than like being specific. After that, things quickly spiraled and when Gypsy was very young,

she was in a motorcycle accident with her grandfather. And even though she only had like scrapes and bruising, it was very like artificial or superficial injuries. Sure. Dee Dee kind of took that and ran with it and put Gypsy in a leg brace. Oh my. Yeah. Then she brought home a wheelchair. She told Gypsy to use it for a few weeks after her motorcycle injury but then a few weeks turned into months until Didi would not allow Gypsy to walk at all anymore. Oh shit. Okay. Yeah. And I remember one thing I mentioned in episode 15 is that Dee Dee would tell people, you know, that Gypsy had this muscular dystrophy and she had this

genetic disorder, this muscular dystrophy genetic disorder, which, you know, makes you slowly lose muscle mass throughout your body over time. And Gypsy looking back had said something like, I had perfectly healthy muscles until she made me sit in a wheelchair for years and not eat proper nutrition and you know then my body deteriorated as a result. It's like its own self-fulfilling prophecy in some way of like, oh well yeah you're right I can't walk but it's also you made sure I can't walk. You're making me sick. Yeah, exactly.

Exactly. So Didi also said Gypsy was diagnosed with severe asthma and that she experienced frequent seizures. She couldn't earn her own money because she needed to be Gypsy's full-time caretaker at home. So instead she received supplemental security income, SSI due to Gypsy's disabilities. She received food assistance and a lot of Gypsy's disabilities, she received food assistance, and a lot of Gypsy's medical expenses,

which I imagine were quite high, and we'll get into that, were covered by Medicaid. So that's kind of how their life was set up. Dee Dee, as far as her friends and neighbors, they always loved her, which I find so interesting because looking back, pop culture only knows her as a villain and then a murder victim, you know, and it's sort of like so weird to hear.

Yeah, but it's nice to know where it all began. Yeah, yeah, she definitely was good at bamboozling people. She clearly was good at this. She was considered very compassionate, very personable. She made a lot of friends really easily. She was considered very compassionate, very personable. She made a lot of friends really easily. She was very like social, so she would have like parties and people over. And she, she just loved like relishing in the attention of having this sick child and saying, oh, despite all we face, like all we're up against, you know, we still.

Well, because then people are patting you on the back. Persevere. What a light. What a, she still, we still... Well, because then people are patting you on the back, like, oh, what a light, what a... She still has her charm despite all of her tragedy, you know, like it's like... It's people treating you like a martyr. Oh, completely, completely. And celebrities like Miranda Lambert even famously visited Gypsy

and gave them a check for several thousand dollars. Rod, who had remarried a woman named Christy, so this would be Gypsy's stepmother, sent $1,200 a month to Dee Dee for Gypsy's care, as the dad. Something he continued doing even after Gypsy turned 18 and he wasn't legally obligated to. Christy was very encouraging of Rod's relationship

with her stepdaughter. And he would call Gypsy on the phone, he would send her presents, and she never really asked for anything specific, but Dee Dee would call Rod and be like, oh, Gypsy wants game consoles and all these expensive things. And he would mail them over, but it wasn't actually anything Gypsy had asked for herself.

So, Dee Dee was kind of using him in that way. Rod and Christie were very supportive of Gypsy. They sent a lot of money her way. They tried to support her through her medical treatments and assessments. They tried to see her as often as they could. And it was just heartbreaking to them that this little girl had to endure so much pain. And that all escalated when Gypsy was only eight years old and Didi called them and said the heartbreaking news that Gypsy had just been diagnosed with leukemia. Every day Didi gave Gypsy a variety of medications, like dozens of them, which she told her was

cancer treatment and Gypsy being eight years old, how is she supposed to know any different? Oh yeah. I mean, I just take it. You just do what your mom says. She only knew that above all else, her mother loved her and would do anything for her. And so she just did what her mom told her to do. And during Gypsy's supposed cancer treatment, Dee Dee brought a new concern to Gypsy's pediatrician, and that was that Gypsy wouldn't eat. Didi brought a new concern to Gypsy's pediatrician and that was that Gypsy wouldn't eat. Didi claimed Gypsy wouldn't eat at all because she was so anxious about eating that she barely ate and they thought it sounded a lot like ARFID, which thank you for teaching me how to say that properly. I only have a step-sibling who has it. Yeah, it actually stands for avoidance slash restrictive food intake disorder.

And this is a condition that causes people to avoid food intake, so avoid eating due to severe anxiety. And they diagnosed her with that. Gypsy then received a feeding tube, which required surgery to create an opening in her abdomen. And instead of chewing and swallowing her food, and remember this girl has no problem with food.

Her mom's just inventing it. So now she has a feeding tube, even though she's a perfectly, she has a perfectly normal appetite, yeah. So do we know if this was like a way to like keep her like slim and trim of like- Just dependent, I think, just another illness. I don't know if this was like on top of it all too.

No, I think, I mean, she was always very small and very weak, so I think a lot of it was to top of it all, too. No, I think, I mean, she was always very small and very weak. So I think a lot of it was to keep her kind of under her thumb. So maybe not skinny, but like small and maybe malnourished a bit and independent. I think dependency was the big thing because I mean, I mentioned this later, but Gypsy thinks about running away and she thinks, I'm being fed through a feeding tube. How am I supposed to run away? You know, it's like, it's just dependent. The whole point of Munchausen by proxy, too, I'm being fed through a feeding tube. How am I supposed to run away? It's like, you're just dependent.

The whole point of munchausen by proxy too is like being needed. Being needed, exactly. Exactly. So yeah, that makes sense. And it's like, she's just going to escalate, escalate, escalate. And a lot of times these cases tragically end in death because where else can you go?

And so she would have liquid nutrition directly fed into her stomach through this feeding tube. And also, this is also a disturbing thought, her mother could administer medication through this feeding tube. So her mom was able to kind of have even more say on what was consumed and what wasn't. There's not even the chance of me spitting out my Flintstones vitamins and hiding them in my pocket like I used to do because they made me throw up. Right now it's just directly into the bloodstream. It's just you had, you keep, she had no choice. Yeah. So this gave Dee Dee absolute control over Gypsy who could no longer eat on her own.

One day Dee Dee, she broke her leg and she had to go to the hospital while she recovered. So Gypsy stayed at home with her grandpa and his second wife. So this would have been not her biological grandmother but her step-grandmother. And Dee Dee very much disliked this woman probably because she had some, saw some red flags maybe. But either way Gypsy's family, her grandpa

and her step-grandma were shocked when Gypsy stayed with them and was eating normally and comfortably the entire time Dee Dee was in the hospital. Nope. And then literally jumped on a trampoline with some other kids. Like... With her legs that don't work.

Yes, exactly. She ate happily, she had no issue, no aversions to food, she could walk fine, she jumped on a trampoline. But when Dee Dee came home, of course, Gypsy had to return to her wheelchair and rely on her feeding tube again. And so then Dee Dee's family is like, okay, these red flags are getting out of hand.

Like how many of- It's not a red flag anymore. We know what's going on now, okay. Yes. But you know, at the same time, they've known Gypsy Rose as being sick her whole life. And so they're not thinking, oh, all of it's fake. They're thinking like, how much of this is being exaggerated?

Right. Or is she getting better and like, what are the signs of that? Right. And she's not 100%. Like is she just not being affected by certain things, but her mom won't let her, you know, explore because she's too worried about her health or her safety. So it was like, how much of it is bullshit? That was their word. And how much of it was real. And it's hard to tell, especially when she is sick because her mother is making her sick. So it's like, technically she's unwell, but it's for different reasons than leukemia. So Gypsy did not even go to school. I imagine that was another control issue. Dee Dee claimed she homeschooled Gypsy, but the family knew that was not true. And then, weirdly enough, Gypsy's step-grandma began to fall ill

and she had these unusual and inexplicable symptoms. And then one day, little Gypsy saw a bottle of Roundup brand weed killer and said, oh, vitamins. And when grandma and grandpa asked, hey, honey, why are you calling those vitamins? She says, those are the vitamins Mommy puts in Grandma's food. Interesting. I'm surprised that they even clocked that because I would have just thought,

oh, a little kid holding anything, they could think like, oh, I'm supposed to just put this in my mouth. Well, but she's not that little. She's like, I'm at 10 or something. Like, she's old enough where she's like, not just saying words. Like she's like, oh, that's what mom puts in the food. And they're like, ah, but she doesn't know enough to realize that's poison, you know?

But the fact that her mom was like, oh, don't mind me, honey. I'm just putting vitamins in and like doesn't even think to hide it. Like, ugh, so disturbing. So of course they come to this horrific realization that Dee Dee is poisoning her own stepmother and so they kick her out of the house and this unfortunately affected both Dee Dee and Gypsy very badly. They had years of housing insecurity, they moved many times

throughout Gypsy's childhood and as they moved farther and farther away and over periods of time it became increasingly difficult for Rod to visit his daughter. So in 2005 Gypsy and Dee Dee are living in New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina blows through and their apartment complex was utterly destroyed so they moved into a shelter for over a month. Dee Dee neglected to contact any family even when she had the chance. I think she, looking back the theory, the assumption is that she liked this feeling of, oh, these people are all wondering if we're okay and alive,

you know, and I'm just gonna leave them hanging. So Rod and Christy are desperately trying to track them down as many families were back then in 05, I remember how horrific that was. And she's just actively not staying in touch, not telling Rod his daughter's alive. Just loving the attention. Just loving it. Just loving being chased, you know? And the storm killed over 1300 people. So, you know, this is no laughing matter. And due to Gypsy's disabilities, as this happened

so often through her childhood, relief workers found a special place for them to live at a hospital and they were flown there by a helicopter. So her mom, of course, is like eating this up, right? Like, oh, we get special attention, we get to be flown around in a helicopter, we get our own special space in the shelter. And so it's just this vicious cycle. Over the years, they had had many charitable accommodations. For example, Ronald McDonald Nonprofit Housing, which a lot of us know is provided for families of children undergoing medical treatments. We already said the Miranda Lambert thing, just a lot of like special treatment, not probably in the eyes of Gypsy, but at least in the eyes of her mother. So in Missouri, Dee Dee began seeking new

diagnoses and treatments for gypsy, because I guess leukemia wasn't enough, I don't know. And she just had to get her fix somehow. And she had a blank slate with a team of new doctors because she told everyone, which I definitely mentioned in episode 15, that all her medical records had been washed away in Hurricane Katrina.

So she basically used that as a convenient excuse to say, everything is gone, just trust me and my history. Oh, it actually, it worked beautifully. Like I mean- Scarily well. To talk, I mean, that's really is such a, it was almost like a blessing for her specifically of like, oh, well now doctors have to listen to me and I can make this- It fit her narrative so perfectly. I mean, well, now doctors have to listen to me. I can make this.

It fit her narrative so perfectly. I mean, she might as well have tripled the shit that was going on in her file. Oh, she sure did. Oh, she did. Okay. Oh, she did. She started adding new diagnoses. She, like, for example, she even said that Gypsy's birth certificate was gone.

So she's like, now I can invent any birthday I want for my child. Right, right. Just like, just sick. And by the way, it wasn't true. Like she still had this stuff. I can invent any birthday I want for my child. Right. Right. Just like, just sick. And by the way, it wasn't true. Like she still had this stuff, but doctors didn't need to know that. This is not your forte of research.

I don't expect you to know this, but do you know if she ever, well, we know what happens to her. So I guess there was no interviews on her end about like knowing she was wrong. I guess my thought is like, it's so funny. You asked that in episode 15 too. Really? I guess I don't change all the time, but I, I do wish, um, I wish I knew if she felt any fucking guilt about this at all. I'm sure gypsy Rose also feels the same way.

Yeah, I know, I know. I'm just thinking. I'm just like, man, like, it's one thing to be doing things and like kind of just make up lies and maybe not have to pay attention to all you're saying, but when you're actively doing stuff like that, like you have to know what you're doing is wrong, or you have to, like, but I know.

I mean, we'll never know. I'm just, I'm looking now into just like a brief scan, um, of Munchausen by proxy. Uh, it's hard to tell. And I think it's such a vague, it's a hard thing to diagnose in a person. And so I think it's not even necessarily fully understood. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong folks, if there's, uh, if there's somebody who knows, which I assume much more than I do about this.

But I do really think- They probably think they're being more helpful than they're not or something. That's what I'm saying. I think it's because it's a mental illness. I think there's an element to it of del delusion maybe, or just like not fully understanding, but also like they're very aware they're wrong, you know? Like they know they're wrong, because they hide shit.

But maybe they think like, oh well. And they change their names and they lie to doctors. Maybe it's also, I mean, part of that like, well, I know better than doctors, so I'm just going to say, I don't know, I don't know, I'm rambling for no reason. Well, but it's like, I know my child better than anyone, you know, and it's like, yeah, yeah, no, and I totally get that.

And you know, it's hard because it's abuse, absolutely. And there's no way to excuse it, but at the same time, it's also a mental disorder. So it's like, it seems like a very messy situation. So it's like, it seems like a very messy situation. And I apologize for not giving a clearer answer. No, I literally started with, I don't expect you to know. I was hoping you'd ask because you asked in episode 15 and I was like, I don't know.

I like how you knew I might ask again and you still didn't know. Well, there's not really an answer. Like I did listen, I actually did study this a little bit because I listened to, so something was wrong. The podcast, they had an expert come in to talk about, I think it was an expert, I forget who it was, but somebody came in with a lot of experience in this field

to discuss munchausen by proxy. And I listened to that and I learned a lot, but also I learned how convoluted it gets, how hard it is to pinpoint, how hard it is to diagnose and how little it's understood. And so it's just one of those things where you don't really get a clear answer, no matter how much you kind of look into it.

And like you said, there's no way to check in with Dee Dee. And even if now she was in prison and she said, oh, I feel really guilty. It's like, well, does she or not? Like we don't even know. Even if she said she did to save face. Yeah, I don't think that's something that you ever really fully recover from.

I don't think she would ever have even admitted it. Yeah, I think she was been like, oh, well, they're persecuted. She would have turned to the victim, I think. Yeah, I don't think she would have ever even admitted to it. I don't know that, that's just an assumption. But yeah, my theory is she would never have even gotten as far as to say she felt guilty because she claimed she did nothing wrong.

That's my theory because it seems like that's how she lived her life. So yeah, that being said, she started looking for new treatments and diagnoses for Gypsy. She had a full blank slate, like I said, with this new team of doctors telling them all the medical records had been vanished and washed away by Katrina. And so Gypsy had all these biopsies and examinations done and they all came back normal. And because of this, one of her doctors, and I'm pretty sure this is fucking Bernardo Flasterstein,

and that's how this name came up, he began to question all these diagnoses. He considered it another red flag that Dee Dee didn't know the exact nature. Remember how I said she was always so vague about things? He was like, why wouldn't you know the exact nature of her cancer or the length of chemo she's been on or the length of treatment?

Why wouldn't you know that as the mother who's so involved in her health? It's shady that you're not giving me the details. And so when a nurse then came forward and presented him with three different files she had gotten about Gypsy, all with a different birth year, not just a different birth date, but a birth year,

he became convinced that she had been kidnapped. He thought she was- Bernardo was so fucking on top of it. I know. And so he really thought like, something is very wrong here. And so he sent the Department of Family Services to their home.

And he told Dee Dee that, the Department of Family Services told Dee Dee they needed to obtain a valid birth certificate. But of course she didn't have it. She said it washed away Katrina and the report kind of got just put in the cabinet somewhere and it was never followed up on. And she left and went to a new doctor.

So it's like, you know, he could have maybe followed up, but like at that point, what can you do? You've already called the authorities. You've already put your concerns in, written them on paper. It's like at a certain point, I, and I don't want to say like, oh, I'm just vouching for all the doctors that didn't, I just don't know what more you could have done. I don't know. Right, right.

So knowing she was now under suspicion after the Department of Family Services came by, Dee Dee simply took Gypsy to a whole new doctor's office and this was just her MO. The second, like anybody raised an eyebrow, she was just out of there. She would change her own name several times. She would often max out other people's credit cards before leaving town.

And there was actually a warrant out for her arrest for writing bad checks. So she would just pack up and move the second anything kind of went wrong. And so wherever they would end up next, Dee Dee would like immediately charm her neighbors. She was always thought of as the most dedicated, doting parent anyone could possibly be. And of course, everyone also fell in love with Gypsy because she was so upbeat and always smiling.

And according to Dee Dee, Gypsy, this is what she would tell the neighbors, you know, who were like, what? Oh, tell us more about your daughter. And she would say Gypsy, when she was born, suffered this traumatic brain injury and she's intellectually disabled. And so therefore she has the mental capacity

of a seven-year-old. And so therefore she has the mental capacity of a seven year old. And so she encouraged Gypsy to pursue things like Disney and Barbies and very like little kid interests because she wanted her to come off as very young and infantile. Yeah, exactly. And so she often dressed Gypsy up in these princess costumes. Like if you look back at a lot of the photos and videos, she's always wearing like princess wigs and princess costumes. And so she didn't have many regular clothes. She only had like a Cinderella dress, a yellow dress. I wonder if now in hindsight, she like can't, she like refuses to fucking watch a Disney

movie. I can't imagine how over it you would be. Yeah, I know. Or like very triggering or like costume parties or like Halloween or something. It's like, oh, the last thing I want to put on a wig ever again. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So she would wear these big wigs, these like curl. And there were like very oftentimes obvious wigs,

because she's also wearing the matching dress, like princess dress, you know? And so she would shave Gypsy's head, Deedee would, and say, well, your hair is gonna fall out due to your medications anyway, so we might as well keep it neat and shave it down. And so she shaved her head regularly. And what a way to excuse her ever having to find out that her hair can grow.

Although when I'm wondering if one of the signs Gypsy caught onto was like, my hair is still coming in buzz. Like, we still have to keep cutting it. Like. I guess, but how would you even know any different? Like, you wouldn't know how an, quote unquote, normal person's hair comes in. That's true.

You know, I don't want to say normal, but like a cancer-free person. I feel like if her mom says like, oh, wow, it's looking really thin, you just, I don't want to say normal, but like a cancer-free person. I feel like if her mom says like, oh wow, it's looking really thin, you just kind of believe her, you know? And it's like, she's so manipulative. I feel like for a long time, I mean, you're right. I think eventually she really definitely, I mean, we know she definitely started to question things. And I think for a long time, her mom would just manipulate her. She's had excuses for everything.

So in 2008, Dee Dee and Gypsy finally move into a house of their own, built by Habitat for Humanity and custom made to accommodate Gypsy's wheelchair. I mean, it's just so fucking heartbreaking. One, that this girl is not even sick. I mean, now she is, but right, like naturally she's not even sick and she's being forced into all this.

Two, there are so many people who are sick and disabled and need... Like that money could have gone to... Exactly. That home could have gone somewhere else. Exactly. Somebody who really needed it and not someone taking advantage. It's just so fucked up. I wonder, like, if Dee Dee were alive today, how many organizations would be like suing

for money? Oh, great point. I mean, the number of Make-A-Wish, they did everything. They did all of those. Ronald McDonald, I mean, it's like their charities. So like, are they gonna be able to sue for, I don't know. And like, does she have the money? No, so I don't know if, but it's got a knock.

I wonder what lawsuits would look like today. I do too. Yeah. In one interview, Gypsy sat beside Dee Dee beaming and said to the camera, it just proves that happy endings aren't just in fairy tales, they're real. And like, I remember seeing this clip

and thinking to myself, that's not a thing a kid says. Like, that's what somebody tells them to say. Yeah, that was scripted for sure. Of course, right? And like, she later said, yeah, my mom told me to say that. And I was like, yeah, even in the moment it felt weird. Why would you say that? We all looked at each other and went, huh? And it's cute, right? She's like, oh, fairy tales are real. And she had this very high pitched,

I mean, if you've seen any of these clips or heard her voice, you know, but she had this kind of very high pitched voice. Dee Dee was as usual, very popular in their new community where this house was built. She often hosted movie nights with a projector in their yard because the neighbors couldn't afford to send their children to the movie theaters. And she would charge for concessions and then like take the money as a fundraising effort

to go toward Gypsy's Medical Care. So of course, as the neighbors, you're thinking, this is amazing. Like my neighbor is hosting these movie nights and we pay a couple bucks for Skittles and we're saving a ton of money, but all our money's going to this good cause.

And she was just pocketing it. And she's just pocketing it, yeah. And so everyone in the neighborhood, you know, went out of their way to support Dee Dee and Gypsy. And of course, if you have like Habitat for Humanity building your house, like no one's gonna question you. Yeah, no one's questioning.

Right? It's like official quote unquote. Cause you're an asshole if you question that. Of course, absolutely. No, you're a hundred percent right. I bet you that was part of the fear too. So of course, on the outside, it all seemed like sunshine and roses and they're, you know, making it work and despite the odds,

like fighting this uphill battle. But of course, as we know now, at home it was not all it seemed. Gypsy would often argue with her mother about her treatments and her alleged ailments, and Dee Dee would punish her. She emotionally manipulated Gypsy until she was convinced that the only way

to receive love and affection was by being submissive. She was made to feel that if she didn't obey her mother, Dee Dee would just abandon her. And she needed two dozen medications at this point daily and she ate through a feeding tube. So like she couldn't just be risking abandonment. Like she had nowhere else to turn. How old was she at this point? So this is 2008. So she would have, she's my age. So 17. 17, yeah. Wow. So, you know, at this point, she knows, she's like in that teenage rebellious spirit,

but she can't do anything about it because- Yeah, there's only so much you can test. Right? And it's not just testing whether you'll be grounded, it's testing whether you'll survive, like life or death. Right. And so she also, at this point, even though she's 17, thought she was still a child.

She thought she was 14. Actually, she thought she was 13 turning 14. And then on her 18th birthday, thought it was her 14th birthday. And her dad called to wish her a happy birthday and made some joke about like, now that you're an adult. And her mom talked to Rod privately and said, you can't say stuff like that. She doesn't know how old she is.

And he didn't think that was weird. He did. He thought that is a huge red flag. And he started getting concerned thinking, what do you mean she doesn't know? Like, because she kept saying, Oh, she's intellectually, you know, stunted and all this. And she, she's not quite, but. Is that why he kept paying for things after she turned 18 to, like, keep with the ruse? No, I think he just thought she's very, very ill. I mean, he just...

He's just being a good guy. Okay. No, he hadn't questioned any of this yet. He's like, that's weird. Like, even though she's, you know, supposedly has this brain injury that can't... And she has the mind of a seven-year-old, like, even a seven-year-old knows they're seven, or like, you know, 14.

It just, that part definitely was a red flag for him, but keep in mind, he has believed since this baby was three months old, that this is a very, very, very frail and sick child. And so like- I can't imagine what he thought when he found out too. Yeah, even at this point, he's thinking, well, that's weird, but not like, oh, all of this is fake.

Just like, well, she's weird, but not like, oh, all of this is fake. Just like, well, she's this kind of a strange... Yeah. ...facet of this illness that she doesn't know how old she is. Like, that's weird. But Dee Dee was obsessed with infantilizing Gypsy. Just another control tactic. For example, when Gypsy had her first period, Dee Dee refused to tell her about pads or tampons

and made Gypsy wear diapers and said, like, this is what you do. And it's just so sad. Well, also, if you believe that you're that sick, bleeding at this point must be like, just like, oh well, another illness. Another symptom, right. Yeah. Like wouldn't even consider it part of puberty. Oh, it's just so sad. And then you think you're years younger. So even though like it is puberty,

you're probably like, oh my God, like I don't know about this. So Gypsy is still bathed with her mother at 18, slept in the same bed. She had very little privacy. She had no control over her life. She learned that if she didn't question Dee Dee, her life was peaceful, happy, content. Her mother treated her nicely.

And if she questioned or spoke up, she just was too terrified of the consequences. She had received enough punishments and consequences that she knew better than to test the waters. For example, some of the punishments were highly invasive medical procedures, which is, hey, my worst nightmare. For example, she started putting numbing gel on Gypsy's gums before doctor's visits so that Gypsy would start drooling, salivating before the four doctor's visits, which is a symptom of muscular dystrophy.

And as a result of this, a surgeon removed Gypsy's salivary glands. Yeah. Oh my God. It gets worse. So saliva, the reason we have it is to protect our teeth from decay and so as a result of her salivary glands being surgically removed, her teeth began to deteriorate and she had to have 16 of her teeth extracted until she was wearing dentures. Wow. And just fun fact that's half of your teeth. So Gypsy also, this is the worst one, underwent numerous eye surgeries, invasive eye surgeries,

because her mother told her to lie about her vision. So they would test her vision and it was fine. And she would just lie and say, like, I don't see that or it's blurry. And they gave her numerous eye procedures and surgeries. It's just absolutely my worst nightmare. It's just sick. It really is. Nobody, nobody should be touching anyone's eyeballs ever. Not for no reason. And reason especially a child and like Didi just insisted she had all these vision issues and and it was just all bullshit so in 2011 Didi takes gypsy so how old is she in 2011 like Yeah, sure So in 2011 Didi takes gypsy to a like a sci-fi convention

It's like an anime comic comic con type thing called Vision Con. And Gypsy loved events like this because what you were saying earlier, kind of same idea, she loved being in a place where other people were dressed up and she didn't feel like a freak. She could go and wear a dress and a wig and it wasn't unusual.

Like she wasn't sticking out. And it had nothing to do with her like... I don't know if she was associating it with her illnesses or anything, but yeah, she felt like probably she was like everybody else. Yes, she felt like she didn't stick out as much. Like it was, everyone's not like staring at you. And so she loved these kind of events

because she didn't look out of place. And while she was at this one in 2011, and keep in mind she's 20 at this point, although she thinks she's what, like, 16, 17? Yeah. There she meets a man in his 30s when he bumps into her wheelchair and apologizes. And so they speak briefly

and kind of like touch base with each other and give each other's basic info. And then he was able to find her on Facebook because she had a secret Facebook page which she used while Dee Dee thought she was playing on Barbie websites. And- Did it have a different name or like was Dee Dee just not-

I think it was Emma Rose was the name. Okay. I was gonna say, well, Gypsy Blanchard, like your mom hasn't looked that up to see if you have a page? She definitely had a fake name. It was, she had almost like a secondary life online, which- A Finsta back in the day.

Finsta, basically. So she had this kind of fake face, or the secret Facebook page. And so this guy found it and they started chatting through Facebook. And the reason she even was able to do this is that a nonprofit for children with leukemia had given Gypsy a laptop as a gift. And so she was able to do this is that a nonprofit for children with leukemia had given Gypsy a laptop as a gift.

And so she was able to use this, thank God, to like find an escape and live some sort of fantasy of a normal teenager life on social media. I'm surprised her mom let her even have a laptop. Well, yeah, it was very much like only for Barbie websites, but I think at the time her mom probably didn't even know. Like a lot of our parents didn't know, and we didn't know the dangers of the internet. It's like, you know, you just say you're on Barbie websites, but I think at the time her mom probably didn't even know like a lot of our parents didn't know and we didn't know The dangers of the internet. It's like, you know, you just say you're on Barbie websites like okay

Yeah, maybe your mom didn't even know what you say club penguin. No a new club penguin could be salacious And I'm sure right now there's some weird shit happened on there And so, you know, she's chatting with this guy on social media secretly in the middle of the night And so, you know, she's chatting with this guy on social media secretly in the middle of the night. And if you ever watch the Joey King version of this, it's so scary when she wakes up in the middle of the night to, like, open her laptop and, like, is so scared

her mother's gonna see. It's like worse than any horror movie. Because you're so afraid. It's the anxiety of, like, your mom finding out that you could actually have a personality outside of what she's concocted. But then the punishment is eye surgery. It's not like, oh, now you can't be on Facebook. It's like, your eyes are going to be cut open. I'm honestly surprised that the doctors,

that she didn't have doctors do surgeries that made her eyesight worse to confirm that she had bad eyesight. Oh, they did. I think they did. I think they actively fucked up her eyes. Oh, fuck. Because she kept saying, her vision's wrong.

Her vision's bad. And if they're giving repeated eye surgeries to someone who has good vision. Yeah, you're right. Oh my God. You know? Okay, yes. It's just, oh my God.

Yeah, it's creating a problem that didn't exist, which is so disturbing. And so she's on Facebook, she's opening up to this new friend, quote unquote, about her life, things her mom makes her do, the fact that she could secretly walk even though her mom made her use her wheelchair. And she kind of built this fantasy idea that this guy was like her knight in shining armor who would rescue her even though he was in his mid-30s and she at least she thought was only 15. So huge red flag, okay, from this guy,

because he also thinks she's 15, just to be clear. That's what she's told him. Okay, so there are multiple crimes happening. She's being victimized by multiple people, yes. Okay, understood. And so she finds by chance one day an insurance card, her own insurance card, and she sees her birth year was 1991,

and she realizes she's not 15, she's 19. And armed with this knowledge, she tells this man, and he's like, hell yeah. Yeah, I'm sure, yeah. Come to my house, oh God. And so he encouraged her to leave Dee Dee and come live with him. And he told her that she's an adult,

she can make her own choices, which technically is true. And so while Dee Dee slept, Gypsy stole several thousand dollars in cash, as well as pain medication, because after a major surgery, I mean, you can't blame a girl, she had become dependent on these medications that her mother was forcing her to take. So she takes these pain pills,

she takes the money and she leaves. And she leaves a note for her mom revealing that she had found out her real age. She packed her bag with her clothes, which were just princess dresses because she didn't have any normal clothes. Oh God. And she hitchhiked out of town wearing a blonde wig.

She arrives at this guy's house and it is of course nothing like the fantasy she has built up in her mind. He was on parole and so he could not move her out of state like he had said he would. And he lived with a friend and again, they're in their 30s and he thought she was 15 at first. So this is all very troubling. Back at home, Dee Dee discovered Gypsy missing, of course, and freaked the

fuck out, then found these messages between Gypsy and this guy on Gypsy's phone. And so she starts calling people who had attended the convention with them until she pinpointed who this guy was. That's amazing that she could even do that. Oh yeah. She was fucking on a war path. Like, there was no way of stopping this woman. She found out this guy's address, she drives there at 8 a.m., knocks on the door, tells Gypsy if she comes home, she could see this guy whenever she wanted,

but she brings a falsified birth certificate insisting that what Gypsy had seen was wrong, and she actually is 15. And so she shows this to the guy and he's like, okay, well, if she's a minor, then like, of course, take her home. Like he just believes it, cause why would somebody lie about that?

And so he thinks like, oh God, this girl's like 15, yeah, take her home. Yeah, uh-oh. Uh-oh. And so, and he's on parole reminder. I'm sure that was gonna look really good to his parole officer. So Gypsy felt this weird pull to believe her mom,

cause why not? Like she has had to trust her mom her whole life. Her mom is insisting like this you're 15, you're not 19. And so she's like, okay, I mean, I guess. And she goes home with her mom, cause also she's not having the time of her life at this guy's house anyway. And so back at the house, Gypsy was punished. Her mother handcuffed her to the bed for two weeks. Oh my God.

She tethered Gypsy's body to her own body at night with a dog leash. So that- Oh my God. Anytime Gypsy shifted her move to her mom would wake up. She slept with a knife on the bedside table as an intimidation tactic. Holy shit. She put a cow tongue and some of Gypsy's menstrual blood in a photo of the man and Gypsy into a mason jar and displayed it and said it was a hex so that she, Gypsy Rose,

would never find love and happiness. Holy fuck. Oh my God. That last one, they got more and more twisted with every sentence you said. It's like physical abuse, emotional abuse, psychological abuse, like every type of abuse. Spiritual abuse. Spiritual abuse, literally, yes. Weird as shit abuse.

Oh my God. And Dee Dee also insisted to Gypsy Rose, fearmongering, that kissing makes you pregnant. And so Gypsy insisted nothing had happened, but Dee Dee forced her to take a pregnancy test. Just humiliating, just horrible. Yeah, it's just degradation at this point. It is, it is. Yeah, it's like exceeded and infantilizing.

It's like degrading now. She began to physically attack Gypsy too. She often punched her. She hit her with coat hangers, like the sharp end of coat hangers. And this was new? This was like after she like... I think it's because she's old enough to fight back now.

Like old enough to like try and rebel. Also, she can also say like, after all I've done for you, you betray me like this. 100%, that is exactly, exactly. She lost the trust she had or something. She's like my little girl, you know, in the Europe. Yeah, exactly. So slowly weeks went by and finally when Gypsy has once again completely submitted to DeeDee,

she's unchained from the bed and allowed small freedoms again, such as bathing herself. And Gypsy has now determined with utter certainty that there is no escaping this house. Dee Dee would always find her and she would be punished and it wasn't worth it. And so she just played nicely and stayed home. And she could have reached out to her father, but she didn't know she could because Dee Dee had told her he was violently abusive and had told her all these stories.

Like for example, Dee Dee's told her that he had once picked Gypsy up by the face and neck as an infant and hurled her across the room. And so Gypsy's terrified of this man. Like she doesn't know that this is all bullshit. And the dad doesn't know that Dee Dee is making all this up either. Right. Right. Right. Right. And he barely knows where they are. So Gypsy had no idea that after finding out his daughter

didn't know her real age, remember that, on her 18th birthday, he saw a big red flag and he and Christie started pushing Dee Dee to say like, we want to see her in person. We want to talk to her. We want to, we don't want these... I feel like that all that did was set Dee Dee up to make sure that she really made sure they never saw him. Like they never saw her? Like really, yeah, like really amped up the abuse allegations or something to like scare her away from everyone. To say like, you don't want to be near him.

Listen to what he's done to you and what he would do to you now if you saw him. Yeah. The fear mongering was very manipulative. And Gypsy just believed like this was her life. And so what she would do is she would sometimes sneak on the computer and just do social media and try to like escape, you know? And one of the things she did is she made an account on a Christian dating website. Ooh, Christian mingle. Was it that?

I imagine it was Christian mingle. It had to be Christian mingle. That was taking the entire town by storm back then. And you know what I bet watching that commercial with your mom, you feel less like you're rebelling when it's like, oh, a godly faithful relationship. And you're like, that can't be so bad, right mom? Like she won't be that upset. Well, things didn't quite go that direction.

But in any case, she met this guy named Nicholas Gotajohn. And once again, she develops this guy named Nicholas Gotajohn. And once again, she develops this fantasy that Nicholas is her savior, but in reality, he takes advantage of her vulnerability and her, like, sheltered lack of understanding of the world. He introduces Gypsy to the BDSM lifestyle, which of course, in and of itself is not a bad thing, but she was so inexperienced at life

that I don't think she quite understood. Understood, yeah. Yeah, also like she was weirdly, I don't know what this means or if there's even any point to this, but it feels like someone who has constantly been degraded their whole life maybe doesn't understand consent the right way for BDSM.

But she's never been a consenting person. That's exactly true. When thinking kissing gets you pregnant. I don't think she, she doesn't know anything about vanilla sex, let alone like a space where like, you're, you could be submissive and things where. Exploring kinks and things like that, yeah. Things that she's already had to deal with

in a non-sexual way. And she's gone through hell already. So it's like, what's the, you know, what's big whoop. Now it's also part of your sex life. Yeah, I don't know what the overlap there is, but there's something there that makes it feel extra off. I do too. I think so too. Yeah. And like you said,

she's never really been consenting at all, like in her own life, in her own home. And so that's, yeah, that's a great point. Can you even understand consent at that point? And so he introduced Gypsy to this lifestyle. He required her to address him as her master Okay, and their relationship escalated until Nicholas insisted he could rescue gypsy If only he was able to murder her mother first Yeah, that's the part I should have gone. Oh my god. Um, that's

Very interesting, okay That's very interesting. Okay. Not a red flag at all. Hot take, I guess, from Nicholas. A super accelerated request from someone who... Even people I've known for 10 years, if they made that request, they'd be like, that's a little too far. Minute one into this relationship is kind of crazy.

Yeah, a little bit tough. But I guess she's calling him master. So it's like, well, she's... She could have thought it was a fantasy or something. It could have been not actually... I think she kind of did. I mean, again, I'm just saying this kind of out of pocket, and she's spoken herself on this topic,

but I think there was an element of like, this is a fantasy life. It's an internet life. It could be real. Yeah, could not be real. And we can all understand that, like growing up with the internet and like trying to figure out what's real, what's not real and having some harsh realities

thrown our way, you know? And so either way she was like, sure, okay. And she encouraged him. And she genuinely at this point also think about how desperate she was just to get out of this fucking house. And she has already tried to escape and she's now getting chained to the bed. I mean, this is an abuser. about how desperate she was just to get out of this fucking house. And she has already tried to escape

and she's now getting chained to the bed. I mean, this is an abuser. If this were like a partner, you wouldn't think twice about like attacking in the middle of the night to get out of there. You know what I mean? And of course it's just so much more twisted because it's apparent.

Or even, I mean, cause maybe it was also, maybe they connected in a way where like, maybe she didn't understand what consent was or if this was real or if this was just the internet talk. But like she also probably also fantasized about hurting her mom or doing whatever it took to escape. Yeah, her mom had been hurting her since she was three months old, you know? Yeah. So I could see like her not totally hating the idea of like, even if this is play pretend, like just an outlet of a creative outlet of like, even if this is Play for 10, like just an outlet of,

a creative outlet of like, what life would be like if I got away from her. And so I, it's odd, but also given the circumstances, I don't think it's like totally unreasonable. I mean, she's in her twenties. She's like 23 at this point. And she can't picture a life outside of this at all, without her mom being out of the picture.

Yeah. Okay, so she's encouraging of this. And like you said, it could be real. It could be just like a fantasy thing on the internet, but either way, she encourages this behavior. She plays into it. And on June 9th, 2015, Nicholas traveled to Missouri, waited outside the Blanchard house for Gypsy's sign that

Dee Dee was asleep, then Gypsy hid in the bathroom while Nicholas stabbed her mother to death. And afterward, according to Gypsy, Nicholas remarked that he was going to sexually violate Dee Dee's remains, and according to Gypsy, she allowed him to rape her instead to protect her mother's body, her mother's remains. Wow, that part gets overlooked pretty often, I think. Is that not so dark? Wow.

I don't even know where to begin with that. I will say, like, there's, because they were, I think they were tried, you know, separately, and they've gone their separate ways. So Nicholas later insisted he never raped or coerced Gypsy and this was all consensual sex in her house after he killed Dee Dee, but you know. Given her mental state and her unawareness

of anything sexual, she was not capable of consent, I don't think. I would argue the same. Okay, also I... And also, even, she was not capable of consent, I don't think. I would argue the same. Okay. Also, I, um, and also, even if she was saying, do it to me instead, I mean, how many times has there been a sexual assault where someone was saying, do it to me instead and like still not wanting it, you know? Exactly. Exactly. Um, and they knew what sex was to even be able to say that.

So like there's, I think, okay, so. And to jump from thinking kissing is going to get you pregnant to... To that. Having sex, violent sex next to your murdered mother's body. Like you can't tell me that that was just a happy consensual thing. I'm sorry. No, that's a trauma that she was not prepared for. I can't wrap my head around that one.

Even if she thought she was consenting to... Exactly. Even if she thought she was consenting to you can kiss me exactly. Even if she thought she was consenting to, you can kiss me, because she thought that's what sex was. Good point. Then imagine finding out as more things happen. I mean, then all of a sudden it actually truly is a full assault because you didn't even... You never saw that coming.

I think it was all becoming very real all at once. And you know- She had to just be in shock. He claimed she was consenting. She claims she wasn't, which let's be real. Who do we believe, you know, in this situation? Even if she said like, yeah, sure, let's do that. Like you said, that does not necessarily imply full consent.

I'm sorry. No. And so anyway, the pair then fled together to Big Bend, Wisconsin. And after several days passed, Gypsy started getting worried because nobody had found out about her mother's death. And as a result, she decided to make a Facebook post to try and get somebody's attention. Interesting. Like it was like going to like a digital scene of the crime.

Yes. Yes. Going back to the scene of crime. You're a hundred percent right. I hadn't even thought of it that way. She was so paranoid that she hadn't been busted that she had to set herself up to get busted? No, she was upset that her mother's body hadn't been found and it was just laying in the house.

She was starting to feel guilty that like no one had discovered her. Yeah. Okay. And so she tried to post on Facebook on her mom's Facebook page to try and, or no, actually she and Dee Dee shared a Facebook page. It was called like Dee Dee. That page still existed during episode 15.

I remember, cause I went and found the posts, which are so disturbing because you can even see. And I'm so mad. I'm like, I bet you I didn't screenshot that. And I'm like so mad it passed me. Cause like no way that still exists. And secondly, like how dumb, maybe it isn't my screenshots, I'll go back and look,

but either way it was very alarming to see the posts, but then also all the neighbors and friends saying, Didi, what is this? This isn't funny. Like you shouldn't say stuff like that. Or like, oh, did you get hacked? And you know, just concerned friends and neighbors being like, what is this about?

Or is this like a movie reference? They had no idea, you know, just concerned friends and neighbors being like what is this about or is this like a movie reference? They had no idea, you know, what was really going on obviously So what happened is she decided to make this Facebook post but Nicholas decided he got to choose what it said So the post said June 14th, by the way, this is five days after the murder She wrote that bitch is dead on Dee Dee's Facebook wall. Friends and family start calling Dee Dee and they're like, shit, this is weird. And they can't get ahold of her.

So they alert police. And there was another post that was even more upsetting. Just not even gonna go there right now. But you can easily Google it. Friends and family couldn't get in contact with Dee Dee, so they alerted the police, and that is how they found the body of Dee Dee. And the way I presented it in episode 15 was like,

this murder, a little bit of setup, then this murder scene with the Facebook posts. And the way it was just so alarming without any context, it's just like, I don't think I'll ever get you that good again. Oh, shucks. Also, I wonder, honestly, like if five days had passed, I'm sure part of it was like wondering if anyone had found her mom. And like, I'm sure like it's, you know,

relationships with our own parents despite an entire story like this are convoluted and complex. But like, I can't imagine after going through something like that, one, having so much trauma and like your mom not actually being there to take care of you for the first time ever. Great for the first time.

And so being scared to be alone, having this, not even knowing how to have your own personhood, because you've never had a moment to have an identity. So that's scary on its own. Having the guilt of what's just happened, the shock of everything that just happened to you and your body, because...

I mean, I can't imagine having all that. You're suddenly sexually active. And honestly, like for the last five days, he's probably been continually assaulting you. Yeah, I mean, if you have to call him master and you're scared to even go outside, yeah, it's not a good look. I imagine that she probably that Facebook post was also a bit of a cry for help of like someone discover her so that way, like, even if I get busted, I'm away from this guy.

Do you remember, do you know, do you remember that she was living in his family's house? Nope. They were like in his family home during this and his parents are just downstairs. Like, this is normal. That's so odd. It's so odd.

For them to be like, what'd she do today? It's like nothing. Post it on Facebook, hee hee. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah, it's just like... It's just all so jarring. But so the police see this Facebook post,

and you're right, it might be a cry for help because they immediately link it to the IP address of the GoToJohn family. And they go up there, they arrest Nicholas and Gypsy. And Gypsy still thinks that she's 19. And the police tell her, you're actually 23. Like she doesn't even know how old she is still. Amazing, truly amazing.

Unbelievable. And so when people saw Gypsy walking in the news, like people who knew her, they were horrified because they're realizing like, oh my God, we've been like coddling this child for so long. And meanwhile, her mother was just abusing her, bamboozling all of us, conning everybody, harming her child.

It's just, people were horrified. People were really, really horrified. I will say though, when Rod, her dad saw her, he was elated because his first thought was, oh my God, she can walk. Oh. Yeah. She can walk, yeah. He was like, oh my God, she can walk. Oh. Yeah. She can walk, yeah.

He was like, oh my God, she can fucking walk. And then it took him a little bit to come around to, wait a minute, no, this is so dark. She could walk the whole time. It just was like, for a moment, he was like, oh my God, she's been healed. And then he's like, wait a minute, all of this was fake. And then it's just this dark, like, bad story.

Yeah, how quickly did it get found out that she was actually fine the entire time and her? It was pretty quick. I think it was the walking on the news was shocking. And then very quickly, it unraveled. And Gypsy's abuse story came to light immediately. Her family stood with her. Her stepmom, Chris, said there was probably never a time in Gypsy's abuse story came to light immediately. Her family stood with her. Her stepmom, Chris, said there was probably never a time

in Gypsy's entire life that she wasn't under lock and key. But of course, many people were criticizing Gypsy and horrified and saying things like, "'Why didn't you stand up for yourself or just leave?' Which like, fuck off. But then, to their point, murder's probably not the best option. But what is the best option?

I don't know. So Gypsy's defenders argued that leaving would be nearly impossible. She had no legal documentation proving her age or identity. So if her mother found her, she could just tell police or tell whoever, oh, this is just a child, and then be punished. And even if she did prove she was an adult,

Dee Dee had spent over two decades convincing everyone that she had an intellectual disability. So even if she was technically old enough, her mom could say, she's not capable of caring for herself. She needs me to take care of her. And people kind of link this to the Britney Spears case sometimes,

like the way that a family can take legal control over your life and claim you're unfit to care for yourself. And it almost like creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, like you said earlier. Dee Dee was so manipulative that dozens of medical professionals had done completely unnecessary and harmful surgeries on Gypsy for 20 years.

And a close family friend who had bonded with Dee Dee after learning about Gypsy's cancer history because her own sister had leukemia, by the way, what a fucking punch in the gut, to realize they were just faking it, said she and everyone else truly believed that Gypsy had the intellectual capacity of a very young child and they treated her as such.

Also, if you're being only spoken to by one person who infantilizes you, if you're only learning what she wants you to learn, it's probably really easy to make sure somebody doesn't grow up. And if you're wearing princess dresses and like playing with Barbies, yeah, I mean, I can see why that would be an easy story to believe. Yeah, I, it's also amazing how many doctors were willing to perform things without any documentation or, or going against their own evidence. Well, one thing that I think happens in these cases is that one doctor will be like, okay, yeah, and diagnose it.

And so suddenly it's in your official medical record that you have leukemia. And it's like, well, it's in the paperwork. Who's going to challenge that? I wonder if there was ever a case or if there was ever a class added to medical school after Gypsy Rose about how to fucking double check things before you put things in official files. I mean, that must be a fine line to walk as a medical professional as well of like challenging some sick child, you know, like I imagine that alone is like a huge hill to have to

walk up if you're going to try and prove to be like an ultra skeptic. Yeah, yeah. And like, I don't know. There's gotta be some sort of, if anyone is listening who's like been to medical school or enough to know like what they teach you about munch house and my proxy, I would love to know like what the protocol for that is.

And I think it's considered such a rare disorder, but it's not quite as rare. As far as I heard on that one podcast episode, like statistically, it's not as rare as people think it is. And there's shades of it, right? There's a spectrum of just exaggerating your child's symptoms. And then there's of course, like making your child ill,

which is the severe side of it, which obviously goes hand in hand with this case. But yeah, she said that this friend who said she had befriended Gypsy Rose and really truly believed that she had this intellectual disability, she claimed that in an interview, she admitted that if Gypsy had pulled her aside

and said, and asked for help, she does not know if she would have believed her. Like she might've gone and told her mom. Like that's how much she was convinced that this was a real deal story. Dang. Which is a horrifying, she was like, it was just a heartbreaking realization

to realize like, even if she came to me and confided in me, I might not have believed her, which is must be, which is very brave to admit, I guess, because I think a lot of us think we would be different, but maybe not. The last time Gypsy left, she of course ended up handcuffed to a bed for two weeks. And she said she was so terrified of her mother

that she never sought help because she knew she'd be punished. And all she had known was just she knew she'd be punished. And all she had known was just this absolute control and no escape. And ultimately, Nicholas Gotajohn, who was tried separately, was convicted of first degree murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Gypsy, meanwhile, was convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to 10 years in prison with the possibility of early release. And in prison, Gypsy said she felt free for the first time in her life,

which is just such a twisted thought. And I mentioned this in episode 15 too, but she apparently gained weight in prison. She's like one of the only people that gained weight in prison because the food, she was so excited to be eating food rather than all the people who were disgusted by cafeteria food.

And so, she said one of her happiest memories is the first day she arrived at prison, went to sit outside at a picnic table and realized she could just talk openly with people and make friendships. Wow. It was just that jarring of a change that it was one of the best days of her life.

And so she did have a substance use disorder for a while after all the surgeries and all the medications she had been on. And she was able to access drugs in prison. She even lied to her stepmom asking for 50 bucks to pay back a woman she owed for drugs. But she was just so disillusioned by her mother's manipulation that she wanted to break the cycle. And she actually called her stepmom and admitted that she lied for the $50 and said she had a substance use disorder. Like she just wanted to be so upfront. And her mom was like-

That's pretty big. It's huge, I think, I totally agree. Cause she could have just turned into her mom immediately. Yeah, or just like let her mom kind of rule her life in that way, like that you're still sick and this is just your life forever. But she said she, she wanted to fight that. And so she was able to recover and she maintained sobriety in prison, which like,

God, that's amazing. She also received an education in prison. She had not been schooled this entire time and rapidly gained weight. Prison almost had to be like really exciting. Like recess or something, you know, it's like you're suddenly free. You just get to learn and you get to talk to people and you get to walk. You get to walk and learn your own... Eat food.

Yeah, yeah. Not be force-fed and ugh. She had obviously deep trauma that not everyone knew what to do with. She didn't have teeth and so her dentures were ill-fitting, didn't fit her anymore. So she wasn't, there was definitely things

she faced in prison. But on December 28th of 2023, Gypsy was released early after serving eight years of her 10 year sentence. And of course, tens of thousands of people now on TikTok instead of Facebook, like anxiously awaited her return to the real world. And she made social media accounts

and she wanted to share her life and talk about her life after prison. And apparently, you know that movie with Joey King that I was mentioning, which is called The Act. And I remember watching it like in total bewilderment and just shock back in the day, even though I'd already covered the story, it was just so alarming.

But apparently she never gave the producers permission to tell her story and never received compensation, which I did not realize at the time. And it's very icky and not cool. Yuck. Very bad. And of course people were celebrating her as an abuse survivor,

but then when she wasn't a perfect victim, people started turning on her and saying like, your attitude, your upbeat attitude is disturbing. Like you should take more accountability. You know, you didn't do this right. You didn't say that right. And Gypsy says she does regret her mother's death every single day and thinks murder is never the answer or an acceptable choice.

She said if she could redo her life, she's not sure whether she would all go all the way back to childhood and ask family for help, or if she would report Nicholas to the police or what she would do. But she said either way she would undo her mother's death because she regrets it every single day. And so today Gypsy's married, she's expecting her first child with her husband.

She's sharing her life in a new series, Gypsy Rose Life After Lock-Up, which I have not seen, but I know got some attention when that started. Is the person she's engaged to, the person that she liked at some point over the computer? The old man? I feel like it was someone from her past that she is now married to.

I thought so too, but I don't know. I don't know how, but I feel like it was like a friend she met online or something, or a friend she met at a convention. I don't know. I don't know. I know she was married to the first guy, and then that got a lot of attention on TikTok, and then they broke up, but I think they broke up because she had feelings for someone from her past.

Oh. We'll find out in Love After Lockup. Love After Lockup, check it out. I'm hoping she's at least compensated for that one a little bit. Oh, okay, her old flame, ex-fiance, Ken Urker. I don't know who that is. Okay, great, we'll find out in Love After Lock out. But in any case, we'll find out.

So she has some mixed feelings understandably about all the medical professionals who failed her and all the traumatic medical procedures with no medical evidence that were unnecessary. And of course, several doctors insist, you know, they tried to intervene and they tried to talk to her alone. But you know, she was, I guess, brainwashed by her own mother. But then Gypsy asked her interviewers to consider whether she is lying about never being offered help

or if the doctors are lying to save face after operating on a child without cause. And I was like, I mean, can't argue with that one. And there's such a long history, this is disturbing, there's such a long history of surgeries that Gypsy didn't know about all of them until she watched interviews with doctors who performed surgeries on her that she didn't even remember having. Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah, I imagine it's all just a big medical blur.

A blur and like just a trauma blur. And so anyways- I can't even, sorry, I can't even imagine the trauma of like, if you actually have an illness now, like the way you psych yourself out. You're right. Or like if you have to take, you're prescribed a medication. Or she's like been going to a doctor, she's pregnant. I imagine going to a hospital to like have, to give birth.

I wonder if she's just like doing a full-blown home birth. She's like, fuck that. Like, I don't know. Yeah, I wouldn't blame her. I mean, I'd tell her, don't do it. But you know, that's me, because I'm a big security cut. Okay, so Gypsy has, you know, a lot of friends and a big support system.

She always was like this very upbeat character. So I think it wasn't hard for her to kind of get back into society in that way. And she started advocating for herself, which is awesome. She did accuse her grandfather of raping her when she was nine years old. But her uncle claims that this story is one Deedee taught her over the years to tell to other people.

As like a, you know, so it's just so fucked up that even the stories about sexual assault are all twisted and we don't even know what's true. Anyway, despite all this, everything she's had to face and process, Gypsy is very excited about her future. And upon her release, she said everything she's had to face and process gypsy is very excited about her future. And upon her release, she said, it's nice to be home. I'm back home in Louisiana enjoying a beautiful day outside.

And I've got a lot of great things happening really soon. Good. So great. Wow. What a story. Sorry, that was so long. Dear Lord. It was a great story, though.

Thank you, M. I hadn't heard it in like 385 episodes or something. Yeah. It's back. Wow. OK, well, sorry to the people who like short episodes, but you're welcome to the people who like long episodes. We really tackled it all today.

And we're supposed to record a listener episode after this. Ha ha ha ha ha. OK, well, since we have to go do a listeners' episode, I guess we just end quickly on this one. Let's do it. Come join us on Patreon if you want. We're at patreon.com slash htwwd podcast, and we do a little after hours, yappy hour, where we continue talking, can you believe it, about different topics, depending on our

mood and feeling of the day. Yay. And that's why we drink.