A TEENAGER has described the heartbreaking horror of discovering her mum had died from taking a massive overdose.

A Burnley inquest was told that depressed Patricia Webster, 46, of Brownhill Avenue, Burnley, had taken five times the fatal level of an anti-depressant after making sure her 19-year-old daughter was out of the house and could not save her.

Victoria Webster told the inquest she had saved her mum once before but this time she locked all the doors and left the key in the lock, so no one could get into the house, before drinking alcohol and taking the overdose.

Mrs Webster had taken an overdose three years ago after separating from her husband but told relatives she had been stupid and would never do it again.

That time, Victoria had realised something was wrong when her mum failed to say her usual "see you later" as she left the house and asked a neighbour to check on her, saving her life after she was found in time to be treated.

Mrs Webster's brother, Douglas Harrison, said she had always seemed a jolly person and he was shocked at the manner of her death.

But Victoria, who lived with her mum, told how this time, on June 19, she had made sure she could not be rescued.

She said her mum had seemed fine that day, as Victoria left to stay over at her boyfriend's, and neighbours who saw her also said she seemed OK.

Pathologist Dr Abdul al Dowd said Mrs Webster had drunk the equivalent of five cans of beer and there were 5,100 micrograms of a prescribed anti-depressant in her blood, which had affected her heart and killed her. A thousand micrograms is fatal.

Coroner Richard Taylor said the fact Mrs Webster had taken such a large dose and had made sure the only person likely to call on her was out, while locking herself in the house and making it difficult to get in, persuaded him it was a deliberate act.

He added: "This is something that had been planned. She took her own life.

"I get a picture here of a lady who did not necessarily want to trouble her family with her problems.

"She had previously taken an overdose and it's only down to the quick-thinking of her daughter that she was found."