what is the disease called where a mother hurts her child and the mother wants everyone to feel sorry for her?

Answer 1

It's called Munchausen's Syndrome By Proxy, and its existence - or at least its prevalence - is in serious doubt.

Origin? Well, there is a German folk tale about a Baron Munchausen, who told tall stories about himself and his heroism in order to gain approval. That's the beginnings of it.

Then some doctors thought that they had discovered a syndrome in which someone hurts him/herself in order to seek medical attention and sympathy. That became known as Munchausen's Syndrome (the heroism attached to the story was dropped). It probably does exist, to a certain extent, as a form of attention-seeking.

It's also been established that some nurses and other carers have the habit of harming their patients in order to be part of the heroic life-saving efforts - sometimes those efforts have come too late. A few nurses have been convicted of this crime: a few years ago in the UK there was a famous case involving a nurse Beverly Allitt, on whose watch several infants died.

Then one Professor Sir Roy Meadow (the first two appelations would be dropped if there were any justice) came to believe that some parents (mothers, mostly) were deliberately harming their children in order to achieve the same sort of thrill of being present in a crisis. He invented the term Munchausen's Syndrome by Proxy; unfortunately he also was far too likely to diagnose it when it plainly did not exist, and in his capacity as an 'expert witness' was responsible for the conviction of several innocent women - the most well-known is Sally Clarke - who not merely suffered the sudden death of several of their children but were also imprisoned on the basis of his word and some very dubious statistics. (Judges and barristers ought to be made to pass Statistics 101 or they would never have fallen for his arguments).

So the present state appears to be: Yes, it exists; No, it is far less common than it used to be believed to be; and any diagnosis thereof should be approached with extreme caution.

Answer 2

Obviously you are not young either otherwise you wouldn't be able to buy bottles of wine, at least you know how horrible a drinking problem is - not nice! You need to sit down and speak to her when she is sober and tell her your concerns and ask her if she would seek help for yours and her sake, and so she can move on in her life - but if she refuses to seek help for herself you can only do so much, and she has to want to change. Your Mom needs to seek help herself and you need to take care of yourself and not worry yourself about it. If you are worried about the children in her care, maybe anonymously let the parents know. Your Mom will have to learn her lesson the hard way. But seek counselling for yourself too ok to help you move on from this as it is not your problem and maybe have a chat to your Dad.

Answer 3

Munchhausen

Answer 4

Munchhausen's By proxy

Answer 5

Stupidity

Answer 6

Munchausen syndrome by proxy

Answer 7

i saw a show where they taped people doing it to their kids in the hospital. Its not the mother all the time either, sometimes its the father...horrible...

Answer 8

munchausen by proxy see the link below

Answer 9

It is called manchousin by proxy. (not sure of the spelling.)

Answer 10

I know what you are speaking of but I cannot think of the name. i am sorry.