Who fakes cancer on the internet? Women [View all]

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Who fakes cancer on the internet? Women
Posted by Donna Trussell on November 29, 2012


Faking illness has been around forever, but the Internet has ushered in new ways to seek attention, and to add convincing flourishes to the stories. These posers are few in number, but the trail of devastation they leave is huge. Real cancer patients and survivors like myself can not fathom such bizarre behavior. I’d love to wake up one morning and find out my diagnosis was just a bad dream, or a mistake at the lab. Most of us would give up every gift, every sympathetic gesture, every new friend if we could just return to the lives we had before cancer. To feel whole and vigorous again, to put death back into the mañana category — these seem like a distant, beautiful dream. Why would anyone willingly jump into the muck of cancer, even in jest?

But they do. Especially women, it turns out.

--snip--

They presumably suffered from Munchausen syndrome (which affects women disproportionately) or perhaps Munchausen by Internet, a new phenomenon that some experts would like to see included in the next edition of the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders).

One study links the syndrome to narcissistic and/or sadistic personalities. The perpetrators easily fool their victims because humans fill in the details unconsciously, based on what they hope to be true. Palm readers and fortune tellers use the same technique on their customers.

But why are the cancer fakers so often women instead of men? I asked Harriet Lerner, psychologist and author of “The Dance of Anger,” about Munchausen and gender.

(Much more at link)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2012/11/29/who-fakes-cancer-on-the-internet-women/

Please let us note: This article is written by a woman, and it goes much deeper than her attention-grabbing headline. (It did grab your attention, right?) I posted this because I found it an interesting read. My family and I recently found out that an acquaintance who claimed to have breast cancer was faking it. Turned out she was even faking it with her own family. I do not know what happened when they found out, as we have not spoken to her since finding out ourselves.