A grieving mother has spoken about the harrowing moment her four-year-old daughter died in a tree climbing accident, days after becoming a big sister.
Elise Thorpe, 29, has spoken for the first time about the death of her daughter Freya, who died in September 2019.
The four-year-old was climbing a tree near the family home in Upper Heyford, near Bicester in Oxfordshire, while wearing a cycling helmet.
She slipped and a strap from the helmet caught on the tree, and despite the best efforts of emergency responders she was pronounced dead in hospital.
Elise revealed her life was ‘destroyed’ and said she would have taken her own life had she not given birth to twins ten days earlier.
She said little Freya ‘had awaited so patiently for nine long and difficult months to become a big sister.’
The 29-year-old added: ‘I am a broken individual, caught in a hellstorm of grief.
‘We live every day and night in hell, torture, sheer shock and grief that cant be comprehended.’
Elise explained how she and Freya’s father Chris were on ‘cloud nine’ having just welcomed twins ten days earlier in February 2019.
Writing on Facebook, she said: ‘It was a normal Sunday – we were on cloud nine after the long-awaited arrival and difficult pregnancy of my twins Kiera and Zack.
‘A brother and sister that Freya had awaited so patiently for nine long and difficult months to become a big sister.’
She said Freya had been invited to a house a ’10 second’ walk away for a play date.
Elise explained that the quiet cul-de-sac was full of parents who ‘confidently let their children out to play’.
But Freya had left the friend’s house without Elise knowing.
She said: ‘I had a gut feeling I wanted her home. Shortly after, I saw an ambulance at the end of the road. I panicked, at the time not knowing why I was panicking.
‘I called my husband to say I was going to get her back. He said ‘no I’m five minutes away, stay with the babies’.
‘I saw his car go past and not return from the little cul-de-sac, I knew something was wrong.’
The 29-year-old added: ‘Imagine being in your home so happy and on top of the world one minute and then in space of a second; never to return home again to a house.’
The couple waited in intensive care at the John Radcliffe Hospital for two days, only to be told she could not be saved.
She said: ‘I never stepped foot inside my home again. This is something I also lost and miss to this day.
‘Had I not given birth only 10 days before we would have taken our lives in the hospital that night, without a shadow of a doubt.’