Trigger warning - incomprehensible tragedy

[Nimbostratus100]

Two beautiful little boys strangled, and mother hung, and the boys looked so well cared for and loved, plenty of toys, nice clothes, lovingly photographed

I just cant bear to think of what went on in that house in those last moments, those poor poor children

How can this happen? How was this impossible to see coming?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-65065560

You can't find it in your heart to vilify a woman who strangled 2 young children to death? You realise 1 of those children had to witness the other child die knowing she was coming for him next, just imagine the terror that child felt, horrific. Yet you can't vilify her because she posted nice videos and was a single mum? OK...

"I guess none of us know the truth, but my take on it, for what it's worth, is that she was a single mum who was struggling and had little in the way of support. It looks to me like she loved those boys very much, she sounded lovely in one of the clips I heard of her voice. They looked happy and well looked after. I would imagine she was really struggling with the pressures of raising her sons alone with no support and she did not see walking away as an option, therefore she did what she did."

Where on earth have you got that load of shite from? She was clearly struggling with her ex having moved on with someone else. More of a case of if I can't have the happy family, then you won't either.

"she could have done ANYTHING BLOODY ANYTHING rather than kill her children. Not picked them up from school, left them at a police station, hospital, bloody shop, on a neighbours doorstep, ANYTHING rather than fill their last hours with fear and horror. She deserves to be vilified!"

Or, you know, left them with their dad who lives round the fucking corner since he's an active parent. Jealous as she might've been by the Disney world holidays with the new partner and the kids, there was no acceptable reason to do what she did.

Absolutely @smashinggrapes should have said that too, just so incensed.

Well, this is the thing though. Did they have anybody else to look after them? Was the dad involved?

I have a husband and I have young kids. But I have no other family. If my husband was an absent father / not interested or whatever, and I died/killed myself....my kids would end up in care. I have experience of the care system and it is horrific.

If this woman was in such a bad place that she felt there was no way out but to kill herself, she was possibly terrified about how her boys lives would be. In care is bad enough but in care because your mum killed yourself? What would the chances be of those boys having a good outcome?

I do admit there's a lot of "if"s in the above. I don't know the full story, nobody does.

Calling her "evil" just doesn't sit right with me. What was her objective? To call her evil suggests she got some sort of enjoyment out of it and I just cant believe for one minute that that's the case.

"Evil" is what I think of in the cases of the mothers/parents who abuse children, or abuse them and then kill them, or neglect them and abuse them. Can't think of the names of specific cases off the top of my head, but you know the ones. The little boy who was killed during lockdown, told to face the wall and not given anything to eat or drink. Killed by his father and his fathers girlfriend.

Those people I think of as evil. This woman I think of as desperate and tragic.

I think there is an important lesson to be learned here.

When people talk about the stigmatisation of mental illness, it is te people who sympathise with people like this woman, who wave away her crimes in the name of mental illness, who are responsible for the image of mental illness which cause it to be stigmatised, which cause people to steer clear of those with mental illness.

After all, if mental illness is responsible for the fact that people kill innocent children, then it stands to reason that the message being put out there is that the mentally ill are unbalanced,violent murderers who cannot be trusted not to murder theirs or your children.

Based on the fact that people seem to think that a mentally ill woman can snap at any time and kill those around her, is it any wonder that people think twice about leaving their children with someone who is mentally ill?

And yet in general, the mentally ill aren’t vile murderers, but you’re all doing a nice job of convincing people that they are.

So @derbylass81 you are saying you would kill your children, rather than have them be taken into care if something happens to you and your husband? Does he know this?

Nope, not saying that.

I've never contemplated suicide.

I'm saying that it crossed my mind as being her reasoning.

How can this happen? How was this impossible to see coming?

Wake up.

Even good looking middle class people with a nice home, well dressed pretty children, and plenty of money, can develop a severe mental illness that wrecks multiple lives.

Even if someone is receiving medical care that appears to be working, their mental illness can develop a crisis point; slide rapidly downhill , they become too delusional/terrified to take their medication/ leave the house/tell a soul. They hide because the voices told them to. With terrible threats to beloved third parties.If you've never experienced or witnessed a paranoid delusion in some one hearing voices, it's very hard to grasp how utterly overwhelming, uncontrollably frightening they are.

Drug use is a common factor. When your teen or partner swears that their "recreational" drug use is harmless; especially cannabis. try to remember that in some people use can cause acute paranoia, psychosis, and is linked to schizophrenia.

it is an abomination for any mother to do this. There are plenty of women suffering with mental health issues that seek help for their childrens sake, instead she put them through undue pain and suffering to meet her own mental health needs.

Unfortunately I think that's a simplification. I had postpartum psychosis after the birth of dc1. I thought he was a doll for weeks and hated him because I believed my baby was dead and that the "authorities" were testing me with a lifelike doll. I wanted to grieve the loss of "my baby" in peace so was angry and resentful and paranoid. I had absolutely no idea of how ill I was so didn't seek help until I was forced to but even then there was limited help even though I was a "middle class professional" as referenced by a previous poster. In fact I'd argue the opposite, that you're more likely to get "help" if you aren't a middle class professional. After all the first psychiatrist I saw referenced my middle class ness, my articulateness and my intelligence as a protective factor and saw no problem with dc1 being in my sole care whilst dh was at work despite the above. Luckily dh wasn't so convinced and neither was psychiatrist number 2. Ultimately though mental health services in the UK are unfunded and lacking.

"Well, this is the thing though. Did they have anybody else to look after them? Was the dad involved?"

Yes. So everything else you've written is fucking nonsense.

Even if they didn’t have a dad present. Anything is better than death. Them poor kids must’ve been so bloody scared and confused as to why their own mum is hurting them, she’s an evil bastard and it’s a damn shame the attempt on herself worked cos she doesn’t have to face any consequences of her actions

guess none of us know the truth, but my take on it, for what it's worth, is that she was a single mum who was struggling and had little in the way of support. It looks to me like she loved those boys very much, she sounded lovely in one of the clips I heard of her voice. They looked happy and well looked after. I would imagine she was really struggling with the pressures of raising her sons alone with no support and she did not see walking away as an option, therefore she did what she did

You might want to read the story fully before giving your take on it

She was not a hard done to struggling single mum. Her ex lived nearby & was active in their sons life.

As for she sounded lovely?? Wtf logic is that. I'm sure there's a video of the guy who killed his wife & daughter recently sounding lovely but I don't remember anyone feeling sorry for him

Shes murdered the 2 people she should have protected & devastated their poor father

I'll save my sympathy for the real victims not an evil bitch who murdered her children.

Well, this is the thing though. Did they have anybody else to look after them? Was the dad involved

Even if he wasn't you don't kill your children

The amount of people being sympathetic or trying to find a reason for her action is unbelievable.

All of those things you said scream "shit mental health".

What’s the point of “vilifying” the killer in this situation. We get to pay ourselves on the back for never contemplating or doing what she did?
like big fucking whoop de do.
Most fathers don’t kill their children.
Most mothers don’t kill their children.
it’s evident that something is very wrong with someone who does.
Pretty much nothing else to say.. or am I missing something?

Pat

"Mental health issues" is something that is bandied around way too much. Their is a huge difference between having depression, anxiety etc, and have a serious illness, psychosis, paranoid schizophrenia and such.
In recent years there have been 2 High profile cases in NW England. A 7 year old girl was stabbed to death by a complete stranger, and a man drowned his own baby in a river. Both were paranoid schizophrenics.
Going back 20+ years in a northern town a baby was reported missing by the mother. She said the baby had been abducted in the town centre. She went home and then rang police. There was a huge search operation with the police helicopter hovering low over the town with a loudspeaker on appealing for help. It was very frightening. Within hours the baby was sadly found in the canal, deceased.
This mother I think also had paranoid schizophrenia.
The point I make is that these cases are not just cut and dried, and the perpetrators tend to have a very serious mental illness, but are somehow deemed safe to live in the community

Some of these comments are vile and if you've never felt like this then you really have no idea what your talking about. I would say that in a few weeks like many other cases like this it will come out that she repeatedly begged mh services and ss for help but was repeatedly let down. Unless you've been in the system I don't think people realise how bad mh services in this country are. In the past iv had suicidal and homicidal thoughts and still got turned away from a&e.

Rubbish. Take the recent convictions of Sarah Lloyd Jones and Alun Titford for six months of slowly neglecting their disabled daughter, Kaylea, to death. They were examined by court psychiatrists and unanimously found to have no mental health disorders during the slow killing whatsoever. They were perfectly sane and perfectly cold in the face of Kayleas suffering, degradation, and pleas for help. In fact, the last night Kaylea was alive she was screaming for help and they told her to “shut up.”

Oh do fuck off.

The only thing which is vile on here are the women defending a murderer. Because that’s all she is, a cold blooded murdering bitch who deserves to rot for all eternity.

If she’d killed herself because she was suffering then she would deserve sympathy, but the fact that she murdered two innocent children, let them watch each other be slaughtered, she balanced out any right to sympathy that she might have had.

But no, let’s blame mh services, let’s blame the ex husband, let’s blame anyone but the woman who murdered her children without a second thought as to how they were suffering, enjoying their suffering for all we know.

I don’t give a fuck about what she was going through. If she’d wanted to die she should have left the children in a safe place to do it. The only person responsible for those children’s deaths is her.

For starters I never once blamed her ex husband. All I'm am saying is how I have felt the same way as this lady so I understand. I begged for help and was sent home to 2 small children after telling mh professionals how homicidal and suicidal i felt, so if this had happened in my situation, then yes mh professionals would be partially to blame. I was lucky that my children's fathers stepped in. I'm guessing by your reaction you have not been in this situation so you really can't understand what this woman was going through, so really shouldn't judge

I’m not defending her but you have to be not in your right mind to kill your own children. Nobody who kills people is in their right mind.

No normal thinking individual murders anyone. But there is a difference between not being right in the head thus leading you to do these things, and being mentally ill where you are the one suffering.

I mean look at the likes of Putin, he’s definitely not right in the head and is happy to kill people. Doesn’t mean he’s mentally ill though.

Ian Brady was actually certifiably mentally ill. But we don’t have sympathy for him do we?

What about Ian Huntley, Fred West, Harold Shipman. Every single one of them won’t have been right in the head. But that doesn’t mean they were mentally ill to the extent they deserved sympathy or understanding.

If someone is suicidal and has homicidal thoughts about their own kids, they should make sure to leave the kids with someone else like their dad or a family member/friend or even alone and then commit suicide if they want to. Literally any option rather than killing the kids would have been better.