Sickened is the autobiograpy of a woman who fell victim of her mother who suffered from the psychological disorder, Munchausen's by proxy, and her journey to as "normal" a life as possible.

Reading a book like Sickened really brings it home what sickos we have living with us on this planet. It's amazing that Julie survived her childhood but there is no way she'd not carry the psychological scars of what was done to her. It seems that her grandmother probably did the same to her mother when she was little. The scariest thing is that her mother carried on'adopting' more children so was able to continue doing the same thing and ruining the childhoods and lives of others. I agree with some of the other reviewers, an epilogue would have been nice, just to know the 'adopted' children were removed from her and she would be kept far away from children in the future. It is frightening to know that there is still someone as sick as her mother out there, taking care of children. I wonder how many mothers suffer from Munchausens by Proxy, and am distressed with how difficult it is for doctors to pick up when the mothers can just jump from doctor to doctor.

I had to read this for a class in child abuse and neglect. Very disturbing, yet impossible to put down. It's a miracle the author is alive to tell her story.

This details a truly devastating childhood, almost unbelievable and certainly unbearable. It was a very good read, especially for those interested in psychology and child/family abuse, wellness, and advocacy. A memoir of Julie Gregory's life of Munchausen by Proxy, wherein a parent or caregiver exaggerates or fabricates illness in a child. Not for the faint of heart and much of this story is very disturbing. But if you can make it through the details, Gregory has a raw and important story to tell and she does it very well.

Read many years ago, just remember being really creeped out and well...sickened.

This was quite a disturbing read and difficult to get through how I finished it is beyond me, it made me feel ill reading such a horrific story of abuse Julie Gregory suffered at the hands of a mother with Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy. Utterly shocking and heartbreaking.

*Book #57/72 of my 2019 coffee table to-read challenge, cont. 2020

Its about this girl who's parents asumes shes sick and always has her missing school to take her to the doctors. The mom takes her to the doctor and tells the doctor all these simptoms she says her daughter has. The weird thing is that her daughter is not sick her mom is just making it up. Her mom takes her to a hospital where the doctor runs all these heart test because she says her daughter has a heart condition. They run several test but all of them came out negative indicating that nothing was wrong with her so they make an incision in her leg to see and hear her heart beat but still they couldnt find anything wrong with her...She ran wawy from home because she had told some one that her parents where abusing the foster kids and her self so her mom got so mad so she told her to do some work before her dad came home to give her her beating.She ran away and lived in a correctional shelter for teens. Her parents ended up turning the story back to her and making her look bad so she droped the charges she had on her parents....She went home again and bagan feeling better.She did not take pills or anything the doctors over the years prescribed. One day when she spent a night at her friends house her house had burnet down over night. Her parents got all the insurence money and her mom went to Mexico with the guy who lent them the trailer...when she came back she told Julie that her husband and planed to burned down the house and that he killed her dog ..

This is an excellent book about a subject more people should take action on.As a nurse I can personally say I have seen how M.By Proxy syndrome can destroy children.Recommended for anyone interested in psychological disorders!

n  n   

"My body, sliced, diced, and probed away from me for nothing."

n  n

Bardzo ciekawa książka, sam temat szalenie interesujący. Ciężko mi było czytać niektóre sceny :(

(originally reviewed at n  elphareads.tumblr.comn)

In college I was a psych major with a focus in abnormal psychology. My final project was about traumatic childhood experiences and the comorbidity with violence later in life, if that gives you an idea of what I spent my time researching back in the day. One disorder that always gave me a serious case of the willies was Munchausen By Proxy. If you have been privy to a LAW AND ORDER marathon, a Lifetime Movie, or even THE SIXTH SENSE in your time, you are probably familiar with this disorder. Unlike Munchausen’s, the patient is not hurting themselves for attention. Instead, they are hurting their child. So fast forward to a couple weeks ago, when I was perusing the browse section of the library website. I stumbled upon a book called SICKENED: THE MEMORI OF A MUNCHAUSEN BY PROXY CHILDHOOD by Julie Gregory. I was repelled by the thought of a child being abused in such a devious way, but my morbid curiosity got the best of me, and I requested it. I’ve heard of these cases from an outside perspective, never from that of the victim. I knew I was going to be in for a rough ride.

Julie Gregory grew up in a family would, at the VERY LEAST, be classified as dysfunctional. Her father was a Vietnam veteran who saw his friend’s head get blown off his body, and who was still suffering from Agent Orange poisoning. Her mother was a former horse stunt woman who was married off at a very young age to a man who could have been her grandfather, only to be widowed in her early twenties and left with nothing before she met Jule’s father. Julie always had a sickly childhood, and her mother would take her to the doctor all the time and insist that something was wrong with her, and demand that all kinds of medical interventions be used on her child. Julie’s story is that of constant medical intervention, along with verbal and emotional abuse by her mother and physical abuse by her father (usually instigated by her mother). As Julie got older she realized that there was something very wrong with all the medical trips, and as she dives into her history she discovers Munchausen’s By Proxy, a disorder that victimizes children at the whims of a attention starved parent.

Woof, this was a hard one to ready. Gregory’s childhood was a constant horror at the hands of her mother, and to a lesser (but no less profound) extent her father, who was easily berated into violence directed towards his daughter by the needling of his wife. Gregory talks about a gamut of horrors that she experienced, and how medial professionals were so quick to believe her mother instead of looking at the evidence in front of their eyes, evidence that would have shown how they were being manipulated. This book was horrifying and upsetting and gritty. Gregory’s parents were awful and vile in many ways, from violent to racist to abusive to just flat out mean. I can’t imagine living through that, and Gregory shows serious courage and strength in sharing her story. There is no denying that. I think that where this story lost me was that the end felt very abrupt, and I am not totally certain on how to find out how it all ended up. It also didn’t feel like as much of the focus was on Munchausen’s By Proxy, so much as an overall abusive family life with parts of it being MBP related. That isn’t to say that this theme doesn’t have a major role in the story, nor is it to say that this realization wasn’t very important to Gregory in her steps to heal.

SICKENED was a very difficult memoir to read, but ultimately I’m glad that I did. I’m also glad that Gregory was comfortable in sharing her story after living through such a hard and awful childhood. Those interested in abnormal psychology may want to give this one a try.

Munchausen syndrome is when you make yourself sick to get attention. Munchausen by proxy is when you make someone else sick to get attention. It's what happened to the little girl in the sixth sense. In this memoir, the author shares her perspective of having lived through it.

Goodreads suggested this to me, perhaps because I gave such a high rating to Carolyn Jessop's memoir about living in Warren Jeff's society. But this is the third memoir that I've read now, and I don't think that I like this genre. Jessop's memoir had a story arc, there was rising tension and promises to the plot, but I don't find that here. In Sickened, you are given sad story after sad story about how terrible this woman's mother was. It read a lot like "A Child Called It," yet seemed even more voyeuristic, if that is possible. It is a disturbing book, which is probably what the author was aiming for, now I know how this disease might play out in my students, and to watch for it, but just when the story was getting interesting, "how is she going to deal with her mother?", the story stopped. I guess there is a sequel? As for me, just reading an encyclopedia article on this syndrome would have been enough. I skimmed after the 100th or so sad story. It was an awful life this woman lived, I'm glad she got out of it, and I'm glad she's helping others, and if you are an activist, this book is for you.