A woman has gotten her entire family shocked after committing suicide while everyone was downstairs celebrating birthday.
A mum-of-seven took her own life while her family sat downstairs celebrating a birthday, an inquest has heard.
According to Metro UK, Carla Murtagh, from Shard End, was found hanged at home by her husband Matthew just weeks after finding out she was pregnant with her eighth child.
The 34-year-old had booked an appointment to terminate the baby but later changed her mind and decided to keep the baby.
Yet just nine days later, the full-time-mum, who had a history of depression, took her own life.
Birmingham Coroner’s Court heard how Carla, 34, was rushed to Heartlands Hospital by paramedics, and A&E staff attempted to resuscitate her.
Doctors performed an emergency caesarian on the mum, who was 25 weeks pregnant at the time, but the baby was stillborn.
A short time later, Carla was pronounced dead by medics.
The inquest heard how she and Matthew already had seven children, aged between 14 months and 15 years.
They had been ‘shocked’ to find Carla was pregnant again in August 2016.
Matthew said: ‘We were shocked because it wasn’t planned. She considered having an abortion because we already had so many children. She was upset, and we were discussing how we were going to have another baby.’
Carla, who suffered with conditions including depression, consulted her GP at the end of August about her pregnancy and told him she wanted an abortion.
After being referred to the BPAS termination service, she was only able to get appointments in Liverpool or Doncaster.
But on October 28, Carla was visited by midwife Donna Grey, who was able to arrange an appointment for her at a Marie Stopes clinic in Birmingham.
She told the hearing: ‘When I went to her home that day she was very upset. She wanted a termination. She was very unsure about her dates of the pregnancy.
‘I spoke to Marie Stopes and they could offer her an appointment. After the consultation, she said, “Thank you. You’ve given me what I’ve been asking for, for a long time.”‘
But when the midwife saw Carla again on November 4, two days before her death, she found she had missed the appointment after deciding to have the baby after all.
‘She told me they’d had a family discussion and decided to keep the baby,’ Ms Grey said. ‘She seemed happy, and wanted to get an appointment for a scan.’
On the day of her death husband Matthew described how she had woken up in a ‘bad mood’, but had otherwise seemed fine.
Carla had started to cook a meal as the family was celebrating a birthday that day.
He had left the house with two of their children to buy a birthday cake from the supermarket.
When they returned, he said Carla had gone upstairs and was ‘acting quiet’.
‘She went upstairs and told me that she wanted to be left alone,’ he said. ‘I went downstairs to dish up the dinner and went up to get her.’
He found his wife hanged in the bedroom and called for help. He attempted CPR as paramedics arrived, and Carla was taken by ambulance to Heartlands Hospital.
A post-mortem examination later revealed the mum-of-seven had alcohol, cannabis and antidepressant fluoxetine in her blood, a combination that could result in Central Nervous System Depression.
Following Carla’s death, the local Clinical Commissioning Group launched an investigation into her care, but no failures were found on the part of her GP or midwives.
Giving a verdict of suicide, Coroner Louise Hunt said: ‘This is a tragedy, and for the family I am so very sorry. It is very sad and you have had to sit through some difficult evidence.
‘In time I hope you can remember the Carla you all loved and not in the sad way that she lost her life.’
