A MOTHER of four-year-old identical twins died after taking a cocktail of unprescribed painkillers, an inquest heard. Leisa Foley, 36, took a variety of powerful opioids to help with back pain and concerns about her weight. Leisa was also suffering with her mental health as she looked after her daughters during lockdown, her sister told […]
A MOTHER of four-year-old identical twins died after taking a cocktail of unprescribed painkillers, an inquest heard.
Leisa Foley, 36, took a variety of powerful opioids to help with back pain and concerns about her weight.
Leisa was also suffering with her mental health as she looked after her daughters during lockdown, her sister told the coroner.
She had been suffering with anxiety and was not sleeping well before she was found dead last July at her flat in Plymouth, Devon.
Six days before her death she had a phone consultation with a GP and said she had memory loss and was “forgetting days”.
Pathologist Dr Deborah Cook said obese Leisa died from the combined effects of the various pills she had been taking.
Three drugs were prescribed, and another four were obtained from an unknown source as they were not available over the counter.
Dr Cook said patients mistakenly believe they are in control of the strong painkillers but in fact they are “very difficult to control”.
She said the morphine-related drugs can “depress the brain and breathing function and can account for sudden death”.
Leisa’s sister Rachel Foley said the twins had been off nursery during the first lockdown and were not due back until August.
Both daughters suffered with a heart condition and Leisa developed PTSD after witnessing one of the girls having a heart attack.
Rachel told the inquest: “Her mental state was not good with lockdown in the flat with both the twins.
“Who got the drugs for her? How was she getting them? Was she buying it off somebody?”
Police found jiffy bags containing blister packs of pills in her flat.
Leisa’s family said she was “unhappy about her weight” and suffering with back pain.
But they said she was a “brilliant mother to the girls” and would not have taken her own life.
Senior Plymouth coroner Ian Arrow said Leisa died from the combined effects of taking five painkillers.
He recorded a verdict of a drug related death.
