Gypsy Rose Blanchard Says She Was Worried About Relapsing After Prison

Gypsy Rose Blanchard says she was afraid of relapsing into substance abuse upon her release from prison last year.

The 33-year-old—who served seven years in prison for the 2015 murder of her abusive mother, Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard—discusses how she previously struggled with opioid addiction in her new book My Time to Stand.

In the memoir, Gypsy Rose Blanchard explains how her mother’s Munchausen syndrome by proxy, which involved Dee Dee fabricating her daughter's illnesses for attention, affected her mental health and led her to seek solace in drugs.

"Her emotions were a whip that snapped against my self-worth. I found solace and escape in drugs, especially after we began fighting a lot," Blanchard wrote, per People.

"I remember the first time I sought out the painkillers for no pain at all, and it was after Mama and I were yelling at each other for what seemed like over an hour. I just wanted to relax. So I popped one of her pills and exhaled."

Although the addiction followed her to prison, Blanchard was eventually able to achieve sobriety behind bars. However, she feared that substances would be easier to find in the real world and make her feel tempted.

"I was concerned about relapsing before I got out of prison because that thought did cross my mind," Blanchard told People.

"When I came out, I was surprised to learn that the family dynamic kept me away from that stuff," she said. "I haven't thought about doing anything. I haven't had any cravings."

Blanchard, who filed for divorce from ex Ryan Anderson after just months of marriage, is pregnant with her first child with boyfriend Ken Urker.

"I'm very blessed that even in the hardest moments of this year with dealing with social media trolls and the self-esteem that could be brought down in all the scrutiny and how hectic that is, I still never considered going back to that," she said.

Her memoir My Time to Stand is available now.