An aggressive verbal confrontation and rising tensions were the final straws in the brief marriage between Gypsy Rose Blanchard and Ryan Anderson.
Blanchard's close friend, Nadiya Vizier, said a "scary" argument between the convicted murderer and Anderson, 36, is what led to the demise of the couple's 2-year union.
"Let me in! Let me in!" Anderson allegedly screamed, while banging on the bathroom door at the couple's Lake Charles, Louisiana, home, in late March. Blanchard had locked herself in their bathroom during the raging argument, according to People.
"He got in her face and screamed," Vizier, a 22-year-old tattoo artist, told the outlet. "Gypsy said that she was afraid he was going to hit her. He didn't – but that happened in the past with her mother. So, her first instinct was to tighten up and be prepared. But she got to safety and called her lawyer, too. Ryan is a big guy, and she told me it was really scary."
Blanchard, 32, reportedly made the decision to put an end to her marriage that night. She packed her things and a few hours later, she was on her way to stay with her dad, Rod Blanchard, and her stepmother, Kristy, at their home 200 miles away in Cut Off, Louisiana, the outlet reported.
Blanchard first met her estranged husband virtually when he emailed her on a whim in 2020. The pair got married in a jailhouse wedding in 2022.
At the time, she was in the middle of serving a 10-year prison sentence for her role in the 2015 murder of her mother, Dee Dee Blanchard.
Experts determined Blanchard was a victim of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental illness in which a primary caretaker acts as if the person they are caring for is sick, often for attention.
Blanchard said Dee Dee forced her to pretend she had leukemia, shaved her head and made her use a wheelchair. Blanchard and her then-boyfriend, Nicholas Godejohn, subsequently plotted and executed the murder of Dee Dee.
Godejohn was sentenced to life for his part.
In late December, after serving seven years, a parole board granted Blanchard's early release, and she and her husband were reunited. But things quickly went sour.
"It was like she was on a leash," Vizier said. "What's the difference between being locked in a prison cell and feeling locked in her own home and marriage? She didn't want to put up with it anymore."
"But I'm glad Gypsy got out of this situation. She's such a good person. I'm glad she called somebody and got help that night," she added. "There are so many rumors about her out there. I had to finally speak up. I want people to know she didn't leave Ryan for Ken. She left him because she wasn't happy anymore."
"It wasn't a genuine relationship," Blanchard's cousin, Bobby Pitre, chimed. "Ryan did it on a dare. He got in touch with Gypsy on a dare, and she took the bait, and it went from there."
Since her split from Anderson, Blanchard has reportedly rekindled her romance with former fiancé Ken Urker.
