For most of the parents, babies are often apple of their eyes. They do all kinds of things to keep their babies out of any danger. It is especially more important to shield the babies as they are defenseless and vulnerable. Children need all the pampering in the world to keep going and that’s where the role of parents come. Once the parents come to know that their baby is sick, they go out of their way to help babies recover from it. They often blame themselves when the child’s situation does not improve. They try to kick themselves for not being able to take precautionary measures. Such is the love of parents. But, a 34-year-old mother Kaylene Bowen who hails from Dallas, Texas, is no ordinary parent.
Bowen was held by police after they came to know that the woman unnecessarily took her child to hundreds of doctors and persuaded them to carry out 13 surgeries on him. The lady actually coaxed doctors to treat her child when he was perfectly fine. She told doctors that her 8-year-old son, Christopher, is terminally ill when he was perfectly healthy. Bowen vowed that her son was suffering from terminal cancer, needing a lung transplant, having milk allergy and also having many other illnesses.
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It is very intriguing that mother herself was putting her child through all kinds of trauma. It was difficult to believe that a mother could actually do these kinds of stuffs. Many wondered why a mother put child through such kind of trauma when she was cognizant that it was not all needed.
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The answer to all those questions came from Christopher’s father himself. Christopher’s father, Ryan Crawford, revealed that Bowen has Munchausen syndrome by proxy (MSbP). MSbP is an illness which forces caretakers to fabricate a series of symptoms in the person they are looking after just to gain attention. “It started eight days after he was born. Every time that he would drink milk, he would throw it up, or so she [said],” Christopher’s father revealed. “It didn’t make sense because I never saw him throw up any milk," Crawford said.
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The baby’s illnesses had also intrigued doctors from the Children’s Medical Center of Dallas as they started scrutinizing the case. They also reported the case to the Child Protective Services. “She started explaining to the judge that the doctors stated my son would never walk. And then she stated that he had problems continuing to eat and that he’s going to need a feeding tube. I was horrified. Because from what I knew, my son was fine. He just needed – not even extra care – he was fine," said the boy's father Ryan Crawford.
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Even if there were suspicion about the case as it was reported to Child Protective Services (CPS), the doctors continued to pursue the case. Christopher’s father, Ryan Crawford has not been in relationship with Kaylene Bowen for many years actually tried to inform the authorities that she was faking her son’s illness. “I blame [myself] for the simple fact that if I was there from the beginning for my son, he would never have had to go through these issues,” he said.
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“I tried over and over and over to convince people that my son wasn’t sick and that she was manipulating the system. It didn’t work. Nobody believed me. He could have died,” Crawford said. “Only God saved him.”
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Bowen was caught red-handed about a month back when she took her son to the Children’s Medical Center and said that the boy had a seizure recently. But, when the doctors conducted medical tests on him, they did not find any evidence of it. Soon, criminal investigation was initiated and Child Protective Services started reviewing the case. The doctors did not find the boy to be sick.
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“I’m still fighting the system. The system doesn’t want to give me my son because they say I don’t know him. But then when I question, well, he doesn’t know his foster family [either], they say, ‘Yeah, you’re right.’ That’s all they say," said Crawford.
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Bowen has now been arrested and put into Dallas County Jail as she faces charge of injuring her child. Now, the child is in foster care post the arrest of his mother. However, Child Protective Services is now being blamed that it could have been stopped the trauma of child years ago if it would have taken the case seriously. The only solace is that the child will now be able to live his life normally.
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