There have been some interesting theories floating around. One that Paul used Gina without her knowledge, which we're not buying since she was quick to shut down her YouTube, MySpace, and picture gallery.
There's another that Gina used Paul. We might be able to buy this a bit more.
But again, it's all speculation. Regardless, we know that Gina, whether it was alone or with an accomplice, used us.
We have added our email address on the right, and welcome any information you would want to pass on that would shed light on this story, or help investigators later on.
We're reading all comments that come in, and we'll give you more information as we get it.
22 comments:
Hmmm....I wonder if she did some damage to readers with some readers claiming Asperger's Syndrome.
I just saw ChipNGrace on a horse site with a Gina saying "hi" to everyone ...using same picture as in the jedidream youtube site.
Here is the link for that introduction:
http://www.sparkpeople.com/myspark/team_messageboard_thread.asp?board=-1x12045x17413940
Can you copy and paste the text here? I can't see all of the characters for the link.
Another ChipNGrace with horses Chip and Gracie w/similar pictures:
http://www.midwesthorsetalk.com/index.php?topic=3789.msg30881
I've made tiny URL's to help with the link being cut off:
http://tinyurl.com/6fe6qj
http://tinyurl.com/5zhkec
HTH's!
That's really interesting that you are all seeing that too, that your kids relate better to people older than them. I'm a recently diagnosed as Aspie, I have always had older friends, and really only had one friend in high school the entire time (and sort of her friends by association). Otherwise, I preferred to hang out with my co-workers at the hardware store I worked at in HS, and even now at 25, my boyfriend (also an Aspie) is 42 years old, and it's not weird at all even though some people think it is... ah well.
That is from the Sparkpeople site... I think that verifies that ChipNGrace is in fact the same person as "Pepe"
I have to tell you, this entire situation makes me physically ill! The lies and lies. Pathetic!
I am just a casual user of CF.com I'm not sure if Chippedaway is "Blake".
Anyway there is an old post with Chippedaway giving an update about a girl in the hospital. The mother then posts a thank you to "Gina" for posting.
Anyway, if you are trying to say that "chippedaway" is "gina" also, this might be a tip off.
http://forums.cysticfibrosis.com/messageview.cfm?catid=18&threadid=11329&highlight_key=y
I hope the truth really comes out. I have read the cf2chat board about this and it really seems Q might be a victim in all this too.
I'm not overly involved in all this. I posted about it in my blog asking people to send love, thoughts and/or prayers to this girl. Many people from all over the world did, and did with genuine emotion for such a emotional thing.
My partner has CF and has had the double lung transplant, she followed it religiously for months, and months, taking on board (from the beginning) any requests by Paul (her apparent friend) for emotional and financial assistance and giving me constant updates so I could share updates with the others who don't even know what CF is but shared openly in their concern for 'Pepe'.
No one wants these 'accusations' to be true, but if 'Pepe's' struggle is genuine how hard is it to prove it?.
If it was my partner I wouldn't be shutting down ALL evidence of her existence just cause I'm pissy about being questioned. I'd in the hospital with my video camera and rubbing a Vlog in your faces....THEN shutting down her story.
Wouldn't you?...
Pete 34, Australia.
The thing I keep noticing with all the Gina/Pepe defenders is NOT ONE PERSON can say where she is, that they have met her face to face, that they have sent something to her hospital etc. Chatting, emailing and talking on the phone mean NOTHING. I don't care how "real" she may seem. Why is her best friends picture on her blog as her own?
http://mutantrevolution.blogspot.com/2008/07/why-we-have-this-site.html
As the medical inaccuracies/improbabilities started piling up, I questioned how “Gina” story could possibly be real. (I am a dr./lung specialist.) I wasn’t at all surprised when the news broke that it was all a farce.
I wondered if Paul/Q might be a victim, but I strongly suspect he was involved. When I first started reading the FOP blog, I worried that the "FOP" who posted updates was a member of the medical team (clearly not a doctor, but perhaps an LPN or RN) and I was concerned about the ethics of this. Then, someone referred to the FOP as "Paul," and I followed the link to his blog. It made sense that a college instructor who was a CF'er and lung tx patient would use both the style of writing and medical nuances not known to laypeople.
Furthermore, someone posted a comment here with an email that Paul allegely sent when a refund for his donation was requested. Paul’s response is craftily worded so as not to confirm or deny that Pepe's story is real.
I suspect there is a “real” Gina behind this but I do not believe that she is deathly ill with tx-related complications. From what I’ve seen posted, I do not even believe she is truthful about having CF.
I seem to believe "Q", who I assume is Paul.
http://cf2chat.com/e107/e107_plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?5544.last
This is what I just read supposedly posted by Paul "Qoof" on the CF2Chat:
This must be the hardest thing I've ever had to write. I am posting it here because this community is the one that supported me so ardently during my struggle and that stood up for Pepe at the expense of many bannings. It is a trusting community for the most part, willing to welcome and support other cystics for no other reason than that they are cystics and share a painful bond that is almost like no other. That trust sometimes gets tested, but it remains the key to sustaining a community where people can seldom meet but often discuss some of their most guarded secrets. As you have written in the past, it is a risky intimacy, given the nature of the Internet. But it is a necessary one in a world in which cystics' cultures are screened before they are admitted even to research conferences.
Today, my trust was breached in a way I can hardly convey. The consequence is that yours was violated as well. Pepe confessed to me after much prodding that she has been propagating a series of lies, that no transplant ever occurred, that no transplant was even in question, that Blake does not exist, and that Pepe has in fact been at home most of this year rather than in ICU as I described in FOP. This makes a moron of me, of course, and a farce of FOP, which 275,000 visitors took at face value for many months. It mocks the hardship I have personally faced, having actually been at 12 percent, as well as the battles many of you wage on a daily basis. It mocks the readers who wept literal tears over her drama, who worried, and who placed their full trust in what was, admittedly, a compelling story. But the story was not true.
The critics will claim I was the mastermind all along. Let them indulge in their troublemaking, which seems to be their main motive. But please know that no one has shed more tears over Pepe's fictional saga or suffered more from this betrayal than I have. As you know, I spent this year in a dual role: trying to help Pepe make it to "transplant," staying up till all hours with her, while simultaneously trying to recover from my own. Some of you know how well this turned out. But worse than the loss of lung function, I feel the loss of a great friend, at least in the capacity I enjoyed previously. Pepe is not a bad person but is certainly a severely troubled one and admits as much. She deeply regrets what happened. But she knows she has no one to blame but herself and that she has hurt many people, including those closest to her. Perhaps this will be the beginning of her liberation from self-deception and the terrible unhappiness that causes it.
I wish for healing: healing in this community, and healing for Pepe, who must learn to accept herself with the same kind of trust and openness with which this group accepts new cystics. To the extent that I enabled her delusions, I apologize to everyone involved. But the delusions were elaborate and well-executed, down to writing a blog against herself from "Blake," and so I never suspected a thing. To those who continue to attack her (and me) for this, perhaps your anger is justified. But I urge you to let it pass, as all anger must. I, for one, am filled with only sadness.
Then how, pray-tell, does he explain all the "updates" where Pepe was vented and unable to speak? Something's still not quite right with his story. Nice try tho.
Quoof/Q/Paul ought to post that on FOP's blog (after making it public again) so the 275,000 people who checked in on, cared about, and prayed for Pepe/Gina can see it.
Wow. What do you all think? I can see a sociopathic woman, skilled at doing this kind of thing before, being able to con a someone in a really vulnerable state, post-transplant, etc. This sounds like FOP's writing style, which was always quite distinctive.
But obviously, we have just all been fooled. So who knows what to think?
Would love to hear opinions!
PAUL/FOP: comment on here????
My thought about the updates is that perhaps Gina had someone call Paul about changes of events who then gave details so that he could write them.
My guess is that Gina isn't alone in this (excluding Q)....
I have known Q for quite some time, before FOP even existed and can tell you that he and I have exchanged emails with him stating that he was reserving his energy for Gina, even though he was going through a very complicated recovery post Transplant himself.
The only reason he opened this blog was to raise funds for a Wii for Gina...as he believed that it would help her endure those long days in the ICU with something to do. I seriously doubt that he had any financial gain with this endeavor. He operated his own blog which again was created long before FOP with auctions and selling t-shirts , which I proudly bought to help a friend.
I believe who he is and what he has been through...
Now that the truth is known about the blog, we need to move on as hard as it is going to be. I will pray for her as well, to get the help she needs.
Sounds like someone is trying to finagle himself out of some deep trouble.
Yea, it does sound that way. How can any of us not be skeptical?
HOWEVER--let's keep open minds and try to establish in our own minds what we believe is true.
IF Paul's story is true--then HE MUST BE DEVASTATED. If he believed in her, and loved her, then just imagine what he has lost. It sounds like he was using up most of his energy on Gina/Pepe/Satan whatever her name is. He would have lost a loved one as surely as if she had died. He would have lost one of the reasons for getting out of bed in the mornings.
If things are as he says they are, I would like for us all to offer him the support and love and concern and prayers that were wasted and squandered by Gina. We can't let her take that away from us, or kill that in us, because it was an awesome thing. I felt betrayed; just imagine how Paul must have felt (again, if it proves true). Let's put our collective energies to a positive use once more and see if we can help this poor guy. We can take back what was stolen from us--and maybe Paul can get something back, too.
I don't know. I am not convinced yet, but am becoming convinced. Let's see......
The thing is now know one can trust or believe anything anymore. And that is very sad.
Things like this affect fundraising for Cf and anything for that matter.
This is probably one of the reasons no one ever wants to donate or help with the cause.
And how do we not know that this isn't Pauls site too and he just got tired of carrying on the fauciad and this was an easier way to end the Gina/Pepe hoax.
So true. We won't know who to trust any more.
But I want to take that back! I don't want to let Pepe have taken that from us! Rather, she did take it, so let's just take it back from her--and to do that, let's make a conscious decision to overcome evil with good. As I posted above, IF AND ONLY IF we are 100% convinced that what Paul says is true, then let's start with him and support him to try to make up for some of what Pepe took from him.
To down with the trolls:
You have done a remarkable thing! Because you took a stand and made this blog and gave us both some evidence and a place to "meet," all these people helped to build an iron-tight case against this seriously delusional sociopath (pepe/gina). I am amazed at how much information we all gathered in a pretty short time. I guess she also doesn't know that the internet can be used to gather information as well as to hurt people. She probably thought she was doing everything anonymously--but she didn't know about the Anti-Troll Detective Agency (haha)!
Thanks!
anon 6:15. pretty weird, I guess she just comes up with various diseases, then joins tons of forums for sympathy. how sad and pathetic.
I noticed the user has already been deleted on the Asperger's site. However, if you hover over her name, in the cached versions of her posts, it does still show the profile page in a pop-up box. the text includes the statement: my bf Paul and I live in Minnesota.
she joined that Asperger's support site on 8/12. My guess is she knew what was coming, and was moving on from CF world. Geez. creepy.
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