Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s relationship history has been anything but conventional, with romances spanning secret dating sites, prison letters, a jailhouse wedding, and an extraordinary reunion with her first fiancé.
The 35-year-old is now grieving the death of her partner Ken Urker, who was found dead at his home in Raceland, Louisiana, on October 1 – his 34th birthday.
Police responded to the property at around 6.15pm and confirmed Urker was dead when officers arrived, with an investigation into his death ongoing.
Blanchard has since said she believes her partner died following an overdose, although she does not know what he took or whether it was intentional.
She described Urker as her ‘forever soulmate’ and an ‘amazing father’ to their daughter Aurora Raina, who was born in December 2024.
The tragedy is the latest chapter in a romantic history that has been unusually intertwined with the events that made Blanchard one of America’s most notorious true-crime figures.
Here is a timeline of her relationships.
2011: An attempted escape with a mystery man
Before Nicholas Godejohn entered the picture, Blanchard has said she tried to escape from her mother, Clauddine ‘Dee Dee’ Blanchard, with a man she had met at a science-fiction convention in 2011.
Blanchard was 19 at the time, although Dee Dee had spent years presenting her daughter as younger and seriously ill.
According to Blanchard’s account, her mother tracked the pair down and convinced the man her daughter was underage.
Blanchard has alleged that after she was brought home, Dee Dee smashed her computer, restrained her to her bed and threatened her if she attempted to leave again.
2012-2015: Nicholas Godejohn
Blanchard’s next relationship would have devastating consequences.
She met Nicholas Godejohn online through a Christian dating website in 2012, while still living with Dee Dee in Missouri.
The two conducted their relationship in secret for more than two years, communicating online while Godejohn lived hundreds of miles away in Wisconsin.
They finally met in person at a cinema in Springfield, Missouri, in March 2015, where they watched Cinderella in an attempted introduction to Dee Dee.
But behind the scenes, Blanchard and Godejohn had begun discussing killing her mother. In June 2015, Godejohn travelled to the Blanchard home and fatally stabbed Dee Dee while Gypsy waited in the bathroom.
The pair fled to Wisconsin but were arrested days later.
Blanchard ultimately pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and received a 10-year prison sentence. Godejohn was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life without parole.
Their romantic relationship ended following their arrests.
2017-2019: Ken Urker enters her life
Two years into her prison sentence, another man got in touch.
Urker wrote to Blanchard in 2017 after watching the HBO documentary Mommy Dead and Dearest, which examined her mother’s death and the abuse Blanchard said she had endured.
What began as a supportive letter quickly became something more. Blanchard and Urker began spending hours talking on the phone, and their friendship developed into a romantic relationship.
During a prison visit in 2018, Urker proposed. Blanchard said he initially gave her a silver band, although it was confiscated by prison officials.
Their first engagement didn’t make it to the altar.
The couple split in 2019 after an on-off period, with Urker later saying he had listened to advice suggesting Blanchard needed time to establish her own identity rather than immediately preparing for marriage.
2020-2024: Ryan Anderson
Another letter then changed the course of Blanchard’s love life.
Louisiana special education teacher Ryan Anderson began writing to her in prison in 2020, reportedly after a colleague challenged him to contact someone famous who was incarcerated.
Blanchard replied, and their correspondence turned into a relationship. They met face-to-face in July 2021 and married in a small prison ceremony the following year.
Anderson was waiting when Blanchard walked out of prison on December 28, 2023, after serving around eight years of her sentence.
But married life on the outside proved short-lived. In March 2024 – roughly three months after her release – Blanchard announced she and Anderson had separated.
She filed for divorce in April and their marriage was legally dissolved in December 2024.
There was, however, already a familiar face reappearing in her life.
2024: Ken Urker returns
Within weeks of separating from Anderson, Blanchard was spending time with her former fiancé again.
She and Urker were spotted together in Louisiana and even got matching husky tattoos, although his mother initially insisted the pair were simply friends.
By late April, there was considerably less ambiguity.
Blanchard confirmed they had officially rekindled their romance, saying their history had given them the ‘perfect foundation for a new beginning’.
She later described Urker as her ‘first love’ and revealed their connection had never entirely disappeared.
Just a few months later, their relationship took another major turn.
July 2024: They’re having a baby
In July, Blanchard announced that she and Urker were expecting their first child together.
Because she was still legally married to Anderson, the pregnancy prompted widespread speculation over the baby’s paternity.
Blanchard later shared the results of a prenatal paternity test confirming Urker was the biological father.
On December 28, 2024 – exactly one year after Blanchard left prison – the couple welcomed daughter Aurora Raina Urker.
The milestone completed a remarkable full circle for a couple who had first fallen in love through prison letters seven years earlier.
2025-2026: Building a life together
Parenthood did not mean the relationship was suddenly smooth sailing.
In 2025, Blanchard and Urker revealed they were attending couples therapy to work on their communication as they adjusted to life together and raising their daughter.
Blanchard said having an impartial person to speak to was particularly useful given the unusual circumstances surrounding their relationship.
After her parole restrictions ended, the pair were also able to live together full-time.
Their relationship had survived an engagement, a breakup lasting years, Blanchard marrying somebody else, a reunion and the arrival of their daughter.
Urker and Blanchard later became engaged for a second time.
October 2026: Ken Urker dies
On October 1, Urker was found dead at a home in Raceland, Louisiana, on his 34th birthday.
Blanchard reportedly became concerned after sending him a birthday message and receiving no response.
The Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office confirmed officers were called to the property at around 6.15pm and said an investigation into his death was continuing.
Blanchard subsequently said she believed Urker had overdosed, although she stressed she did not know whether it was intentional.
Speaking to TMZ, Blanchard said her boyfriend faced ‘cruelty directed toward him was something no human being should have to endure.’
She said she believes the harassment had a ‘profound impact’ on the 34-year-old.
‘Ken was an amazing father and a man who was deeply loved,’ she said in a statement, adding that she will make sure ‘she grows up knowing how deeply her father loved her and who he was beyond what strangers on the internet chose to say about him.’
Speaking to People, Blanchard later said she doesn’t know whether the alleged overdose was intentional or not.
She said: ‘I believe the tremendous weight of that scrutiny and harassment had a profound impact on him, and I hope his passing serves as a reminder that there is a real person behind every screen, every headline, and every comment.’
She described Urker, whom she first connected with in 2017 behind the bars, as her ‘forever soulmate.’
The 35-year-old told People about her grief and shock: ‘He was not in a good state of mind lately.
‘I’m in disbelief. I can’t think. ‘I’ve screamed until my throat burns.’
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