'My mother poisoned me and gave me a tumour'

By Raffaella Ciccarelli|

'My mother poisoned me and gave me a tumour'
'My mother poisoned me and gave me a tumour'
'She said something was wrong with me'

From records that she knows of, Jay* was five when her mother started poisoning her.

"She would put different things in my foods, different combinations of medicines, or she would take me around to doctors until one of them agreed with something she said was wrong with me," she told 9Honey.

Jay is a Munchausen syndrome by proxy (MSbP) survivor, a syndrome where offenders – usually a mother – fabricate or exaggerate illness in their child for attention.

Jay* was five when her mother started poisoning her. (Supplied)

"It's so counterintuitive. It seems like a mother would never do such a thing to a child," M.D Marc D. Feldman, a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and author of Dying to be Ill: True Stories of Medical Deception, told 9Honey.

"But in 95 per cent of cases its the mother, and of the remaining five per cent many are women as well; such as day-care providers, or even nurses."

M.D Feldman explained that these women enjoy fabricating illness in children for several reasons.

1. To feel special and get sympathy and concern

2. To control those around them, such as family members and friends

3. To re-enact abuse that they have experienced in their own childhoods

4. To establish gratifying associations with high-status professionals, such as doctors

5. To force the dependency of the victim

6. To express rage toward authorities


While we know basic characteristics of such women –they're often narcissistic, borderline personalities and histrionic – not much is known about the actual condition because a lot of cases go undetected, M.D Feldman said.

"We say there are between 600-1200 new cases per year in the United States but that is based on research in the UK and we've just extrapolated it to the US.

"It's also been judged that five to 10 per cent of children who die of a result of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) in fact have died because of Munchausen syndrome by proxy suffocation. That's quite high," M.D Feldman said.


Dr. Jon Jureidini, a child psychiatrist at the Womens and Childrens Hospital in Adelaide, agrees that it is hard to secure a MSbP diagnosis.

"Munchausen syndrome by proxy cases are extremely hard to diagnose and hard to monitor," he told 9Honey.

It often comes down to a third-party to pick up on cases, which can take years.

"These mothers rarely admit to the abuse, and they never report themselves, so we depend upon getting someone who is knowledgeable about Munchausen syndrome by proxy to put all the pieces together," M.D Feldman explained.

"For investigators to build a strong case, unfortunately the pattern of abuse would have to occur over many years. It takes over a year from the onset of the mother's behaviour for the diagnosis to occur on average."

While MSbP, or Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another - as it is also known, is a recognised mental illness, experts are quick to point out that this classification is also problematic.

"This is criminal behaviour, it is abusive. There are serious ramifications to calling it a mental illness. Were already seeing cases in which mothers are saying 'I'm not responsible for killing my child, because I'm a helpless victim'," M.D Feldman explained.

Dr. Jureidini agrees.


"Munchausen syndrome by proxy is a "stupid" name. It's not a good idea to think of it as a condition of the perpetrator, but more as a kind of abuse," he told 9Honey.

"What we need to be vigilant about, is children who are being over-presented for medical attention. If you think somebody's medical history is not making sense that is something you should be questioning."

In the end doctors did start to question Jay's medical history.

She was 16 when doctors realised something wasn't quite right; she was diagnosed with a pituitary tumour, a type of brain tumour.

Her doctors believe this tumour is linked to her mother's misuse of medications.

"Doctors think the brain tumour might be linked to the poisoning because some of the anti-depressants she had me on and she had me on three or four at one point, raised my prolactin. The tumour has also been known to show up because of head trauma and she was physically abusive too - she loved to hit me in the head," Jay said.

"She actually smiled when the doctor told me I had a tumour. She sat there and smiled, like she accomplished something big by making me that ill."

Despite the abuse she suffered, Jay is doing her best to move on with her life. She is now happily married, with five children of her own.

"I have forgiven my mother, and I love her for whatever weird reason. I seek her approval in this weird way, but I know its not going to happen so I had to cut ties."

She urges other MSbP victims not to give up hope.

"It gets better, it really does, even all the damage that is done to you. As long as you're strong and you keep fighting through it, and make a life that is so much different to the one that you're living now. And it's not all in your head."


 *Name has been changed to protect identity.

Contact reporter Raffaella Ciccarelli at rciccarelli@nine.com.au
