Apparently the last summary of Cheecha Kicks Cancer wasn’t very clear. I’m going to summarize the Tumblr again and then give more proof that Chelsea Hassinger is the person behind the hoax.
The Goldberg family were supposed to be a jolly group of wisecracking siblings from Pennsylvania. When one of their own, sister Chelsea, was diagnosed with Leukemia, the Goldberg clan stepped in to support their sister in any way they could. They camped out in her hospital room, made her laugh, and basically dropped whatever they were doing to step in and carry her through her illness. They were a good family.
None of them exists. There is no record anywhere for this family, and Chelsea Goldberg is not a patient at any hospital in Pennsylvania.
If you read the Tumblr blog closely, especially if you have a comparative literature background, it becomes pretty obvious that the same person is writing as Chelsea, Chad, Matt, Lindsay, Annabelle, Ryan, and Tanner. Their sentence structure, word choice, and paragraph structures are exactly the same. Sure, Chad is “the angry one” and Annie is “the nice one,” but all in all, the voices are too similar to have been written by more than one person.
Also, when you’re looking over the Tumblr, note that there are never any group pictures of the Goldberg family together. There are pictures of Chelsea and Matt (who is actually Chelsea Hassinger’s brother-in-law) and lots of pictures of Chelsea by herself, but no group shot of the siblings together.
The pictures of Chelsea and her mother? They’re the real Chelsea Hassinger and her mother.
Anyway, each of the siblings would update the Tumblr blog with every aspect of Chelsea Goldberg’s illness. They’d remind the world constantly that their sister was brave, strong, funny and a smart ass. She was their very own superhero, right in their own family.
All of the Goldberg siblings are fictional and the work of one person, Chelsea Hassinger.
Oh, the “Goldbergs” also found people faking cancer on Tumblr along the way.
One might question why the brother of a cancer patient was doing google image searches for IV poles, but who am I to judge?
All of the pictures on the blog of medical equipment were stolen from places online. Chelsea Hassinger manipulated the images so they were more difficult to find, but we worked around that. Most of them were taken before 2008.
Remember Chelsea’s hotel room suite from the blog? The one with the silk flowers that “Chad” got upset about because they might compromise Chelsea’s delicate immune system?
It’s from this website.
Chelsea Hassinger contacted me and denied being the person behind it. She claims that someone stole her pictures off of Facebook and that she is currently battling Stage 4 AML. There is no such thing as Stage 4 AML.
Also, when images are saved from Facebook, the EXIF date will tell us that. The image that “Chelsea Goldberg” posted of her guitars on the wall? The one that just happened to have been taken at her fiance Colin ‘s house? That image had EXIF data that showed it had never been saved from Facebook. It went directly from a cell phone to the blog page.
Chelsea has done this before. She couldn’t explain away the hitRECord drama and that she had been outed faking cancer last year by the friends she had made on the site. She told them she was a patient at Duke, among other things, and the friends checked and found that every story Chelsea told them was a lie. When I brought this up, she told me she’d be happy to explain it at some point. So far, I haven’t heard an explanation.
Oh, also, Chelsea’s email is almost the exact same thing as the URL for the “Life and Times of Cancer Girl” blog that was published under her name.
I should also say that Chelsea Hassinger has a criminal record for fraud and deceit.
As far as the “Cancer Girl Problems” blog that was discussed in the last entry, I’m slowly gathering info about who found that blog. The screen shots I posted on that entry show Chelsea “Goldberg’s” cover story as to how someone could have possibly found pictures of her on a blog claiming to be a different Chelsea from a different state. Hopefully, I’ll have updates to share as more information comes in.
I’d like to ask Chelsea Goldberg’s Tumblr friends why someone who has cancer would take a picture of an IV pole from 2005, make it black and white, resize it and post it as “their view.” Literally NONE of her cancer “proof” pictures are real.
You all are so adorable. I can’t wait for the truth to come out.
I’m so sorry you’re being deceived like this. If you’d like, I can post another update with more proof.
Oh yes. Please show us more proof.
If this is who I think from tumblr, I do believe you’re also Chelsea.
You mean http://constantlywriting.tumblr.com/ ? because I think it is Chelsea also.
I can assure everyone that this person isn’t Chelsea. We’ve been in contact via email and her IP is in a completely different state. She’s just a friend that is having a hard time processing the truth.
Anon above me-yes. I don’t really know if this is the right place to discuss it, but there’s something off about that person that goes further than a friend in denial, and I believe it’s Chelsea.
I apologize. I’m very sorry about this whole situation.
She was posting as Chelseainwonderland at Blog for a Cure. Just fyi. Part of what made me think she was fake was when I saw that “Life and Times” blog. The timing was all off compared to what she was saying on BFAC. I did send the link and your info to the web owner. I think she has several fakes posting there. Have to go check but I think there is more than one stage 4 AML, too. I didn’t even know that was not a possible cancer dx.
Hey, this is one of her former hitRECord friends. I can’t even tell you how much all of her lies and deceit upset members of the community. She even attended one of our live shows (Halloween 2011) and met some of us in person, and then went on to meet up with others on separate occasions (including her “cancer coming out” event, that “coincidentally” happened shortly after JGL starred in 50/50 as a cancer patient). She led people on, people who considered themselves her good friends. She “finger-painted” pictures and submitted them to the site, claiming they were therapeutic art she did when she was out of it from chemo. Some of her plagiarized art made it into one of our published books, which gave the hitRECord team a lot of trouble. I really appreciate that you are going through the trouble of exposing her for all of her lies and psychotic, manipulative behavior. She has hurt so many, and caused others great inconvenience. She is truly a pathetic individual, and I find it truly disturbing that I ever interacted with her and called her a friend.
You know, I’ve been a reader for a while, but rarely ever post. I was shocked and slightly naive that faking a disease, is actually a thing. While the disease I suffer from, in comparison to cancer, is not much, the constant pain and quality of life that I have lost in the past year has been a knock to my world. That being said, I have found a bit of peace with talking to others going through the same things I am going through, and understand how terrible this un-curable life sentence really is sometimes. I feel that if one of the girls I’ve met through online support groups or though the chronic illness, chronic pain, endometriosis tag on tumblr, it would really put a knock to my world. These are people I spill my heart out to, people that I feel like -really- get me because they are going through the same thing. I understand how people would firmly believe their friend. But man, with evidence this concrete, this compelling, how could you not start to realize that you’ve been lied to?: God, it’s going to hurt (I admit that) but you cant be that naive, can you?
Another takedown – well done and thank you. There might be more fakers out there, but this is at least sending a message to them that they are not untouchable. That it can all come crashing down the moment someone starts poking at the lies.
I think people make the mistake of thinking too, that because it’s on the internet, it’s not real and doesn’t carry consequences. Oh, but it does. It’s still fraud.
They need to get some originality though… why is it always cancer of all things? I guess shave your head and that’s enough to get people feeling sorry for you. 😛
It is a HUGE blow in the face of those who legitimately suffer from serious illnesses. Most of us wouldn’t wish what they go through on their worst enemies because it is utterly hell. But I do wish these people could suffer something like this for REAL – karma would be good that way.
Also, I’d really love if you ever get the time with all this faker-busting – to read a post on how you go about digging up all the info and putting it together, a day in the life of an internet slueth I guess 🙂 and signs to look for if you suspect someone isn’t all they say they are.
She can’t. If she gives out too much info on the process it’ll teach the hoaxers how to hoax smarter.
Very true. We really do have to walk a fine line in exposing things and proving our point and writing a how-to in how to fake cancer online. If anyone wants to chat about it, you could email me at warriorelihoax@gmail.com.
Thank you, I didn’t even think about that! It makes perfect sense. We definitely do NOT need a how-to.
I have actually emailed you recently 🙂
I can’t see the Life and Times blog…apparently I need to be invited?
I’d like to hear more about her stage 4 AML considering that this type of cancer is not staged out like that. A quick internet search would have provided her with that information. If she can steal other’s pictures and crop them to make them her own, why wouldn’t she be smarter and Google a little more about AML?? So glad you caught another one. Using this to teach my children that you really can’t/shouldn’t trust much of what you see on the internet! As a former cancer nurse, I’m disgusted that anyone would seek this type of attention. Cancer devastates families. Why would anyone want to pretend to have any part of that?? Is the attention really worth it?
aml is definately not staged my six month old grandson had this type of leukiema, it is very nasty and very aggressive. what a nasty piece of work to fake something like this.
Is AML staged at all? Or is it just stage 4 that isn’t applicable? On Blog for a Cure, we have two stage 4ers. two stage3s, and a number of stage 1s. Jill wrote up a post about you guys, Taryn, warning the site members about these hoaxers, and referring them to your page for further info. As always, thanks for all you do!
From what I understand, there’s subtypes of it-but not “stages” like other cancers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acute_myeloid_leukemia They have a good list of how they classify it here.
I know I’m a little late commenting. But what if her intention wasn’t meant to be profiting. Maybe she just needed friends and support from a community like the cancer community. A community that can come together and not hate. It makes me wonder what her story is. She has one of her own to be wanting this kind of support from people.
I hear you but there are ways to find support like that without faking cancer and hurting so many people.
She has an opportunity right here, right now, to tell her story. I really hope she does, through Taryn. Honestly, if she knows how to do honest.
Emotional fraud can be quite damaging, just like financial fraud. I supported Chelsea on Blog for a Cure. I have about 200 people I support there. It takes a lot of time and thought on my part to respond to people’s posts. I have cancer myself, and only so much energy to spare. Basically, Chelsea “stole” the time and energy from me that I could have spent supporting someone who really had cancer. I also am very suspicious right now of EVERYBODY, and while I guess that’s the way you have to be in the online world, it still makes me feel like not supporting anyone at all. I sent out some care packages to people whom I believed were going through treatment. Now I never do that anymore, because it might all be a fake. So the intention of any fraud is always to “profit” in some fashion…it’s not just about money. There are loads of online forums that could have given someone like this support without having to lie about it. People like Chelsea are essentially parasites.
I am very sorry you and the people from that site were deceived, Ann.
I agree Ann, what these scammers steal is the ability to reach out and believe in someone else. In my case, because I have lost someone dear to me from cancer, it makes me wonder who thought I was only being a drama queen about our situation. When you are living a life devastated by cancer, your emotions are already on high alert so it makes you so much more susceptible to being hurt
It is my belief that Chelsea craves the attention her claim of having cancer brought, not the support of a community. If it was the support of a community she wanted, she had it. She had a whole group of friends on hitRECord who supported her. They supported her enough to travel to her house in NC over Thanksgiving just to be with her after her “diagnosis.”
Maybe rather than speculating on anything about why any of this has happened, people should wait to hear the truth from Taryn. Adding fuel to a fire that is already burning isn’t making anything any better or any clearer.
How is anyone “adding fuel to the fire” here?
The assumptions that any of us know what reason or what the story truly is. Let things be explained. Then accept them as they are and move on with your lives. It doesn’t physically impact anyone commenting on this. It also doesn’t seem fair to judge a person before they’ve had a trial and isn’t that what’s going on in this case?
Nothing bad has happened on here, and I think a lot of that is out of respect for Taryn and the way she handles these things. However, the Tumblr seen has become rather contentious. People are frustrated and upset. There is some hatin’ brewin’ up on there, and the only way I see it ending is with some extensive closure to this mess.
I very much appreciate the patience that everyone has shown, and I promise, there will be a resolution to this tomorrow.
The reality of these cases is that they will never be fully explained (except sometimes in the obvious scamming for money ones). By discussing it here, we’re given the opportunity to work through our feelings about this case, and others like it. I don’t know about the Tumblr situation, but no one has been disrespectful in this thread. and as someone who supported Chelsea at BFAC, I was personally affected by her. I don’t have the right to express my feelings about that? It’s interesting that many of us sign with our real names, but the one “don’t talk about this” person calls him/herself “Lurker”.
Stage 4 AML, my butt. My son has AML and anyone that is familiar with it AT ALL would immediately be calling BS. It is people like this that make me hesitant to follow other children and teenagers with cancer. I really get attached to these kids and it would break my heart to find out that anyone I had been following was just a big liar. :/