A "caring" school worker troubled by an "innocuous" incident as a child was discovered dead in a Travelodge after convincing her parents she was meeting a friend, an inquest heard. Rebecca Blezard, 36, suffered from mental health issues following an experience in her youth which she spent years blaming herself for.
South Manchester Coroners Court heard on Wednesday, March 22, that Ms Blezard's mental wellbeing had spiralled from September 2020 and she had eventually moved back in with her parents. Originally from Oldham, Rebecca had been living in Wakefield at the time while working as an inclusion manager at a school in West Yorkshire, the Manchester Evening News reports.
Health professionals told the court how Ms Blezard constantly said she no longer wanted to be alive and was found standing on the hard shoulder of a motorway just weeks before her death. Her parents were hopeful she was turning a corner in May 2022 when she announced she was meeting a friend for a night out in Manchester city centre and was staying in a Travelodge.
Instead, Ms Blezard had booked a room at the hotel in Audenshaw, Tameside, where she stayed for three nights before taking her own life. Her father, James Blezard, told the court he first became aware of his daughter's mental health problems after receiving a call from her workplace in September 2020.
She took time off work and returned to a property she previously owned in Oldham before travelling back to Wakefield. She was later admitted to A&E after suffering with her mental health in December of that year.
After selling up in Oldham and moving in briefly with a partner in Rotheram, Rebecca was back with her parents in September 2021. Mr Blezard told the court: "She felt she couldn't carry on. She came to us and that's when we knew the full impact of her mental condition. She wanted us to take her to A&E so she could be admitted to hospital."
Ms Blezard spent about eight weeks inside a hospital in Barnsley where she was in "absolute distress" and "would cry her eyes out" during visits from her family.
The inquest heard Ms Blezard started private sessions with therapist, Dr Karin Adamson. Dr Adamson explained how a "relatively innocuous" incident in Rebecca's childhood had become "a block" in her mind - and she felt "a lot of guilt and blame for".
Ms Blezard spent eight days in hospital in March 2022, where her mum and dad noticed she seemed to be worse in the ward than at home. Her mum, Elizabeth Fraser, said: "I could see we were losing her - we were desperate."
After she was discharged from hospital, Rebecca was given ongoing care from teams at Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust and also had therapy sessions with Dr Adamson.
However, psychiatrists told how Ms Brezar had still made other attempts to harm herself including being found by police on April 28 on the hard shoulder of a motorway. In the last month of her life, many of Rebecca's family and friends regularly visited her as they tried to improve her condition.
Discussing a visit on May 11, Nicola Madden, interim team manager at Oldham Home Treatment Team, said: "She felt it was selfish that [her family and friends] wanted her to live. She had spoken about visiting Switzerland [for euthanasia] but realised it was not an easy way out."
In one of her last conversations before her death, assessment coordinator Sahira Afzal said Ms Blezard "recognised she was unwell and there was scope to get better", but the inquest heard she had been secretly planning her suicide at the same time.
Last May, Rebecca showed her parents the Travelodge she claimed would be staying at with a friend in Piccadilly and her mum and dad allowed her to go, believing that socialising in the city would be good for her.
On the morning of May 21, Ms Blezard sent two texts to her mum, with the second telling her she would return home that afternoon. Travelodge staff later discovered Ms Blezard dead in her room after 2pm following check-out time.
Police discovered a series of notes in her room, including one apologising to the person who would find her and multiple messages left for loved ones. The court heard in one of the notes Ms Blezard wrote how her "mind has literally snapped", while another requested she was not resuscitated.
Mr Farrow concluded Ms Blezard's death had been the result of suicide. He said: "Rebecca was adept at presenting a public face even in her most desperate times, which masked the true depth of her despair."
Paying tribute to his beloved daughter, Mr Blezard said: "Rebecca was a very caring person. She was fun to be with, she had many friends, she liked to be social.
"Everybody that met her immediately took to her and she took to them. She did tend to look after people more than herself. She was absolutely, as far as I'm concerned, an amazing person and we have been told by many of her friends exactly the same thing."
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