Sisters kill themselves just eight weeks apart

A mother whose two daughters committed suicide two months apart has told of her despair. Kate Borau found her youngest daughter Isabel, 17, dead at her flat on 10 November last year. She had hanged herself.

Eight weeks later, Isabel's devastated sister Anna, 21, killed herself in the same way.

Mrs Borau is trying to come to terms with the double tragedy while trying to comfort her two other daughters, Emily, 23, and Jenny, 18, and seven-year old-son Hannes.

She said: "I cannot describe the turmoil I feel. My heart is broken but I also feel numb, like I'm in a permanent state of stock.

"To bury one child hurts more than you can ever imagine but to bury a second so soon afterwards is a hundred times more painful.

"To lose two beautiful, young, intelligent women, my best friends and my whole world, is like losing my limbs. My world has caved in."

This is not the first time Mrs Borau has had to deal with the pain of losing a loved one to suicide.

Peter, her husband and father of the five children, drowned himself in the Thames in 2005. He was 51.

Isabel, known as Izzy, had been living at a rented flat in Benhill Avenue, Sutton, and appeared to be doing well.

A few days before she died, she was told she had achieved a B grade in her English GCSE exam.

Mrs Borau said: "We were all so close and I thought we could tell each other everything.

"We had no idea Izzy was depressed. She never said anything to us about being unhappy. She was a bright girl and had her whole life ahead of her.

"She'd been through some tough times and had been a troublesome teen but we did not realise she was unhappy or struggling to cope.

"I honestly believe the suicide was a cry for help which went drastically wrong. No mother can believe their child really wants to kill themselves."

She said Anna was so distressed by her sister's death that she moved back home from Brighton, where she was living and trying to get work as a model.

Mrs Borau said: "Anna was my rock. She was so strong for all of us."

But early this month, Anna said she was going out for dinner. She was found dead the next day at a friend's flat in Crawley, West Sussex.

Next to her body was a suicide note to her mother which said: "I love you, carry on and be strong."

Mrs Borau said: "To lose two children in such a short space of time is beyond horror. I had five children 10 weeks ago. Now I have three.

"My only comfort in all this is that I know Anna and Izzy are together."

Anna's funeral will take place at Chiltern Church in Chiltern Road, Sutton.