Penniless, Friendless, Driven to Desperation by Their Disturbed Daughter's Addiction to Spending, Bill and Wendy Flew to Tenerife and Walked Into the Sea. Here, Told for the First Time, Is the Heartbreaking Story of Their Suicide Pact . . . ; Suicides

Daily Mail › November 13, 2004

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Summary

THE last letter was written on the beach in Tenerife just hours before they shared the antidepressants and walked into the sea. It was more an explanation of what was to come than a plea for help. There had been quite enough of those over the years, all futile. Bill and Wendy Ainscow agreed that they were now beyond assistance.

Mrs Ainscow wrote the words in a neat, measured hand which gave little hint of the turmoil within. Poignantly, she addressed them not to a friend, or a relative, but to the editor of the local newspaper back home in Britain - one of the few organisations to have offered sympathy for her plight.

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Extract

Penniless, Friendless, Driven to Desperation by Their Disturbed Daughter's Addiction to Spending, Bill and Wendy Flew to Tenerife and Walked Into the Sea. Here, Told for the First Time, Is the Heartbreaking Story of Their Suicide Pact . . . ; Suicides

'Dear Editor,' it read. 'Recently you put an article in your paper about us and our daughter Lisa and how the National Health Service has abandoned her.

Since that article appeared, we have continued in our hopeless attempts to look after her ourselves.

'We realise now that this is an impossible task which we have had to abandon as she is proving to be much too much for us to cope with.

'Bill is 75 and my health is none too good. There is still no attempt to provide any form of help, therefore we have chosen that the only way out is to end our lives. Much as we do not want to do this, there is not any other course of action.

'We came to Tenerife on a cheap one-way ticket and have been sleeping on the beach f...

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