Gypsy Rose Blanchard's husband has opened up about marriage with his wife who was imprisoned for seven years.
Back in 2015, the 32-year-old was arrested for her role in the murder of her mother, Clauddine 'Dee Dee' Blanchard, whose life was tragically cut short at the hands of Nicholas Godejohn.
The shocking story gained momentum after it was revealed that the late mother falsely claimed that Gypsy suffered from leukemia, muscular dystrophy, and other severe illnesses.
Despite the fabrications - and the many unnecessary medical procedures she'd undergone as a result - Gypsy was found to be in good health and experts believed that Dee Dee had Munchausen syndrome by proxy - which is a psychological disorder marked by attention-seeking behavior by a caregiver.
Due to Dee Dee’s actions, Gypsy was prescribed a litany of unnecessary medications and had to sleep using a breathing machine. She also went through several surgeries, including procedures on her eyes and the removal of her salivary glands - which were all orchestrated by her mother.
The claim that her daughter was developmentally delayed garnered massive attention through the media as Dee Dee sought charitable donations, a Disney World trip, and even moved into a new home in Springfield, Missouri, which was built by Habitat for Humanity.
Under the control of her mother, Gypsy enlisted the help of her then-boyfriend, whom she met on a Christian dating website, to carry out the murder. In June 2015, Nicholas fatally stabbed Dee Dee while she slept.
Gypsy pleaded guilty in 2016 to second-degree murder, receiving a 10-year sentence in exchange for her testimony against Nicholas, who received life without parole.
After seven years behind bars, she was released from prison on Thursday (December 28) and shared her joy with a selfie posted to Instagram, captioning it: "First selfie of freedom!"
As Gypsy is now looking forward to moving in with her husband, Ryan Scott Anderson, the couple opened up to PEOPLE about how their romance began.
The Louisiana special education teacher revealed that he reached out to his wife in 2020 through a letter that detailed how inspiring he found her story, after being inspired to reach out when a colleague said they were planning to write to Tiger King's Joe Maldonado in prison. He told his pal: "'I'll tell you what, if you write him, I'll write Gypsy Rose Blanchard.' I never thought she'd be my wife."
"I remember telling her what her story meant to me, and on the second page I just let her have it," the 37-year-old said. "I told her everything about me."
Ryan quipped that the "main reason" Gypsy responded to him was because he was from her home state, adding: "So I credit that as being the most important thing."
He also revealed that he was smitten from the get-go, sharing: "I remember I had butterflies when we'd email. But really what set it over the top was the first time I heard her voice."
The couple tied the knot in a small prison ceremony on July 21, 2022, at Chillicothe Correctional Center. As the facility didn't allow conjugal visits, they plan to consummate their marriage and start a family now that she is out.
"We're in love," Gypsy, whose gone through years of therapy, said. "It's hard because I'm going into a new life and I'm newly married, and I'm going to have kids one day, and I'm going to have to explain to my kids why their grandmother on mommy's side isn't around. And that's going to be a really hard conversation."
She admitted that despite all the heartbreaking difficulties that she went through under Dee Dee's care, she is not worried about hurting her children the same way.
"Whenever someone says, 'Do you think that because of what you went through, you're going to do that to your kids?' I say, 'You know what? Absolutely not.'" she said. "I have learned what not to do. I have no concerns about my parenting when it comes to that."
Gypsy also shared that she doesn't "foresee any major hardships," with her husband, adding: "I think this, being in prison, has been the hard part. I think when I'm at home with my family, with my husband's arms around me and I'm surrounded by my loved ones, that is when I will be happy."