Her life up in smoke
My beautiful, bright girl thought her habit was harmless, but I knew it was destroying her...
Holding my hands up to admire my manicure, I grinned. ‘Shall I paint yours?’ I asked my little girl Emily, then 6. ‘We’re not allowed to have nail polish at school,’ she shrugged.
‘Just a clear one?’ I suggested.
‘No, Mummy, I’ll get into trouble.’
I smiled.
She was stubborn as anything, my Emily, a stickler for the rules.
While her big brother was often getting told off, she was rarely in trouble.
Chalk and cheese they were, but close as anything.
By their teens, they were going on nights out together, or playing computer games.
The three of us loved messing about, having water fights, photobombing strangers and singing to Lily Allen in the car.
But when her brother left for university, things changed.
In August 2012, when Emily was 16, we went on a camper-van holiday across America.
One night there was a row. Emily stormed into the van, and a few minutes later I followed. Her leg was covered in blood.
‘What’s happened?’ I gasped.
‘I’ve been self-harming,’ she admitted tearfully. My heart sank.
My baby girl.
Back home the GP referred her to CAMHS, the child and adolescent mental health service.
I wasn’t sure what was happening with Emily, but in March 2013, her dad and I split.
My focus was on getting her better.
In time, Emily seemed to be happier, more relaxed.
She started college, made new friends. Even asked to have some mates round.
Then she developed chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and was forced to leave college.
It’d been triggered by a bad bout of glandular fever she had at school.
Still, she met a boyfriend, and they’d spend every moment together.
But one thing worried me – drugs.
Emily had told me she’d smoked marijuana with her friends in the past.
I didn’t like it, but I knew lots of kids experimented, and thought weed was pretty harmless.
Now, though, she was smoking it all the time.
She was really anxious and I’m sure that the two things were connected.
‘You have to stop smoking,’ I urged.
‘Don’t be daft, Mum, I’m fine,’ she said.
I felt helpless.
After two years Emily’s boyfriend broke up with her. She was heartbroken, but finally stopped smoking. I was relieved. Because her CFS meant she struggled to work, in December 2015, I bought her a house.
I’d met someone new, and moved in with him, and just wanted Emily to be happy.
She thrived, even going back to college.
But a year later, alarm bells rang.
Emily started tarot reading, but, as she drew my cards, she claimed they were talking to her.
‘Are you smoking again?’ I demanded.
‘Yes,’ she admitted.
I knew it.
‘Russell Brand’s been to
Emily seemed to be happier, more relaxed
see me, he had a message,’ she told me one day.
‘My friend’s the reincarnation of Jesus,’ she said another time. I rang Emily’s dad. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ I admitted.
We both agreed that she needed help.
But over the next few days, I was passed from pillar to post.
Emily became convinced someone was trying to kill her, and that me and her dad were trying to get her locked up.
‘She needs rehab,’ her dad said.
We were both sure that it was the marijuana causing her psychosis.
Emily didn’t want help. And the doctors said she wasn’t poorly enough to be sectioned by force.
I visited her regularly to make sure she was OK.
Yet her dad and I stopped giving her money, so she couldn’t spend it on weed.
Instead, I gave her supermarket vouchers.
But as the months passed, I saw her less and less.
On her 23rd birthday in February 2019, when I was with her, she was lucid for 10 minutes, but then started ranting – believing that she was Mary Magdalene.
She rang often, but I didn’t always answer, as she usually asked for cash and got angry when I said no.
I felt guilty, but didn’t know how to get through to her.
We were advised that she needed to hit rock bottom before she’d help herself.
Then in May she texted. Let’s go for a girly day out. I smiled. At last…
I couldn’t wait to spend some time with her.
But before we got chance, on 14 May I was working from home when the phone rang. It was the police.
‘Can we come and see you about Emily?’ the officer said.
They wouldn’t tell me more on the phone but, an hour later, they arrived. And I knew instantly. ‘She’s dead, isn’t she?’ I whispered.
‘I’m afraid she is,’ the officer replied.
They explained to me that Emily had been found dead next to a multi-storey car park.
My bright, beautiful, funny daughter.
Over the next months , I discovered that Emily had been using the supermarket vouchers
I was giving her to buy video games, which she was then selling to buy cannabis.
And that she was shoplifting for food to eat. Oh, Emily, I sighed.
At the inquest in January 2021, it was ruled that she’d taken her own life.
I know cannabis caused Emily’s death.
Before she started smoking, she had problems, but she was mostly happy and healthy.
I saw her spiral into psychosis when she started smoking regularly.
I’ll always wonder if I could’ve done more.
But Emily didn’t think she had a problem, and it’s harder to help someone like that.
Now I want everyone to be aware that marijuana isn’t a harmless drug, a bit of fun.
It can destroy your mental health.
On bad days, I blame myself for what happened.
But on good days, I just think about my wonderful Emily, and I’m so very grateful for the time that we had together.
And I know she would’ve wanted me to carry on and try to be happy.
So for her, I will.
She believed she was Mary Magdalene