Andrea Dunlop

And we have to be kind of realistic about that.

And then I think there's the totally separate question of, is this a person who is safe around children?

And you can still preserve someone's humanity and say, but okay, you've crossed some lines here where we're not going to take chances leaving children alone in your care.

And I wanted to ask you, you know, because this is a question I think that it's really important to me to ask any survivor.

Like dealing with child abuse is quite complicated as a society, right?

When is it better to remove the child from that situation?

When do we give someone a second chance?

What interventions do we use?

Just speaking for you, not on behalf of all Munchausen, you know, by proxy survivors everywhere, what do you wish had happened in your situation?

Yeah, I can, and that's something that we talked about a little bit when we talked for your show.

That's a really common misperception slash bad faith argument, depending on who's making it, because there are people who are very invested in the idea that this just isn't a real form of abuse, and so that is an argument that they use.

So number one, there is no – it's a complete –

false argument that if a child has a real health condition, that means that that is sort of exculpatory, right?

That like that means abuse is not happening.

Of course, abuse can happen if a person has a real thing.

Because Munchausen by proxy abuse encompasses exaggerating, inducing, and fabricating, you know, illnesses in a child.

And so I don't know anything about your genetic condition that you do have, but I would guess that quite a lot of the interventions that your mom...

you know, applied had nothing to do with your condition.

And so it doesn't mean that they can't make it worse.

And we know, and also, so there's that.