No Mothers Day Card For This Mother

MayorBob.

Posted to Etcetera on Sun May 04, 2008 at 08:10:04 AM EST (promoted by port1080). RSS.

Laurie Williamson presented herself as a totally involved, concerned mother whose kids had medical problems. Over a ten year period, she took her kids from one doctor to the next, pointing out a variety of physical maladies she said the children were suffering. The children, ages 8, 11 and 13 now, showed symptoms of the afflictions that Williamson told the doctors the children were suffering. The doctors responded by ordering medical treatments and, sometimes surgeries, to treat them. As it turned out, it was all a lie as Laurie Williamson made up the medical maladies, coached the children to act like they were really ill, and collected a whole bunch of money from the state and people who bought into her tales of woe. All that is at an end as the 40-year-old Spring, Texas woman is facing the next 15 years behind bars.

Williamson is believed to suffer from Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome (MBPS), a mental disorder in which a parent (typically a mother) will fabricate or induce illnesses in their children in order to have the children receive medical treatment. At times, the MBPS perpetrator will perform an act to seemingly save the victim from death, thereby making themselves look like a hero. Many times it just tends to be a case where the perpetrator is seeking attention for themselves in being the parent of seriously ill child combined with the satisfaction of hoodwinking medical professionals they consider to be smarter and more powerful than themselves. The condition (which didn't exist as a disorder until 1977) is not considered a mental illness, therefore MBPS is not a valid defense against criminal charges. In spite of a growing list of documented cases that MBPS is a very real and very scary condition, there are people convinced that most MBPS perpetrators are actually innocent victims of a medical establishment which can't admit error and overly aggressive child welfare agencies.

Williamson's case has another, more revolting, aspect to it in that she was apparently making her children appear ill so she could make money. She was a a part time nurse when she began taking her eldest child to a series of doctors in the mid-1990s. Over a ten year period, she took all three kids to more than 500 doctors' appointments. She would offer her opinion as to what the symptoms the children - afflictions ranging from Tourette's syndrome, Crohn's disease, epilepsy and other conditions. She was able to get doctors to prescribe treatments because she had coached her children so well - actually telling them they suffered from these things, forcing them to display symptoms and telling them, unless they went along with her, they would not live to see 15. She was convicted of two charges having to do with convincing doctors to implant a nerve-stimulation device and a gastric-feeding button in her son. Her defense that she was innocent and she was simply following medical advice given to her by doctors failed to convince the jury.

Along the way, Williamson publicized the plight of her children and, according to Harris County prosecutor Mike Trent, she raised about (US)$150,000 from people who heard about her case. According to the Texas Child Protective Services (CPS) people who intervened in 2006, her children were malnourished, on feeding tubes and in wheelchairs when they were removed from Williamson's home.