Gypsy Rose Blanchard was born to Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard and Rod Blanchard on July 27, 1991. But while Dee Dee became the central, controlling figure of her childhood, Rod spent years trying to stay in his daughter’s life from a distance, often blocked by the woman he divorced before Gypsy was even born.
The story of Gypsy’s parents is a study in two vastly different legacies. Dee Dee was convicted by public opinion after her 2015 murder for the years of medical abuse she inflicted on her daughter. Rod, meanwhile, spent nearly two decades paying child support and sending gifts, unaware of the truth about his daughter’s health or the abuse she was enduring.
Who Was Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s Mother, Dee Dee Blanchard?
Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard was born in 1967 and raised in Louisiana. She met Rod Blanchard when he was a high school student and she was in her early twenties. The couple married after Dee Dee became pregnant with Gypsy. According to Rod, Dee Dee lied about her age when they met, telling him she was 21 when she was actually 23 or 24.
Dee Dee is believed to have suffered from Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental illness in which a caregiver fabricates or induces illness in someone under their care to gain sympathy and attention. From the time Gypsy was an infant, Dee Dee claimed her daughter suffered from a cascade of serious conditions including sleep apnea, leukemia, muscular dystrophy, and epilepsy.
She shaved Gypsy’s head, forced her into a wheelchair despite Gypsy being able to walk, had unnecessary surgeries performed including the removal of her salivary glands, and put her on medications that caused her teeth to crumble. Dee Dee also isolated Gypsy from her father and extended family, moving frequently and limiting contact with the outside world.
Dee Dee was murdered on June 14, 2015, in Springfield, Missouri. She was stabbed 17 times by Gypsy’s then-boyfriend Nicholas Godejohn, in a plot Gypsy orchestrated in what she described as a desperate attempt to escape years of abuse.
Who Is Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s Father, Rod Blanchard?
Rod Blanchard was 17 years old when he met Dee Dee. He married her when she became pregnant, but the marriage was short-lived. He turned 18 and realized he had made a mistake.
“I woke up on my birthday, on my 18th birthday, and realized I wasn’t where I was supposed to be,” Rod told BuzzFeed News. “I wasn’t in love with her, really. I knew I got married for the wrong reasons”.
Rod and Dee Dee divorced shortly before Gypsy was born. He remarried Kristy Blanchard when Gypsy was about three months old, and the couple had two children together, including Gypsy’s half-sister Mia. Rod worked as a ship master for Edison Chouest Offshore and lives in Cut Off, Louisiana.
Despite the divorce, Rod remained involved in Gypsy’s life for her first decade. He and Kristy visited regularly and brought gifts. But when Gypsy was 10, Dee Dee moved her to Missouri and began limiting contact more aggressively. Rod continued paying $1,200 per month in child support even after Gypsy turned 18, believing she was genuinely disabled and unable to care for herself.
The Gifts Dee Dee Said Were From Charity
Gypsy later revealed that her mother told her the gifts Rod sent, including a television and video games, were donated by charities, not from her father. Dee Dee also claimed to neighbors that Rod was an abusive drug addict and alcoholic who had abandoned the family. Rod said those were lies.
In her 2024 memoir My Time to Stand, Gypsy wrote about her mother’s manipulation and the years of lies that kept her isolated from her father.
Reconnection and Reconciliation
Gypsy and Rod reconnected after her arrest for Dee Dee’s murder in 2015. Their relationship grew during her time in prison. Rod started a Change.org petition titled “Free Gypsy Rose Blanchard,” pleading for her early release.
In a 2018 interview with Fox News, Rod described their bond as “a hundred times better” than it had ever been. “We email each other. She can call me anytime and she does. I’m keeping tabs on all of her accomplishments in school”.
Rod was part of Gypsy’s welcome-home celebration when she was released from prison on December 28, 2023. The two shared an emotional embrace outside the Chillicothe Correctional Center.
Rod’s Regrets
Rod has spoken publicly about his guilt over not recognizing what was happening to his daughter. In the 2017 documentary Mommy Dead and Dearest and in subsequent interviews, he expressed regret for not pushing harder to stay in her life.
“I regret so much, honestly. I could’ve done so much more, dug a little deeper,” Rod said.
“I could have built that relationship with her,” he added. “She wouldn’t have hesitated to call me and say, ‘Daddy, this ain’t right’”.
The Family Today
Gypsy’s relationship with her father and stepmother Kristy remains one of her strongest support systems. In a 2024 interview, Gypsy described Kristy as the “mom that I always wanted to have”. Rod and Kristy hosted her homecoming party after her release and have been present for major milestones since.
For a woman whose childhood was defined by lies and isolation, the reconnection with her father represents one of the few genuine relationships she was able to rebuild after prison.
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