Depressing news, today. It seems appearance is still so important and life-changing that a 26 year old took her own life after she became fixated on perfecting the colour of her hair. Frances Warren went missing immediately after a hairdresser’s appointment in May last year. Two days later, police found her body in Sedgley in the West Midlands, 80 miles away from her home town of Thornbury in Gloucestershire.
In the inquest into her death this week it emerged that Frances had developed anxiety and depression while living with her parents to save up to go travelling with boyfriend Sam Cotton. Doctors were aware of her mental disorders, but didn’t consider her a suicide risk. However, she refused to take anti-depressants and her mental health deteriorated as she became obessed with her hair.
A statement from her boyfriend Sam was read out at her inquest at Avon Coroner’s Court: 'Throughout the two months leading up to her death she had problems with her hair. She changed her colour four or five times and had had it recoloured since March but was uncontrollably upset and wouldn’t listen when I said it was OK. It took over her life.'
Her mother Marjorie’s statement explained that Frances's previous signs of improvement had waned after one bad dye-job. 'All of a sudden she wasn't happy with it, saying it was ginger and her whole world was falling apart. She said things like wishing she was dead, she hated how she looked, she appeared to have lost all confidence and her appearance was everything.'
Frances then texted a new hairdresser, Kelly Hill, asking her to come and sort out her hair. She didn't text her once or twice, but 50 times. But after Kelly dyed it twice at Frances’s request and she'd taken ‘photos of it in every room so that she could see what it was like in different light,’ Frances still wasn't happy.
'She started to shake and appeared very stressed and freaked out by the look. She then asked me to bleach her hair but I said I couldn't.’ Frances then decided to take off: 'All of a sudden her mood changed and she became very calm and told me she just needed to go for a drive.’
Just before she went missing, Kelly texted friends about her hair. 'I can recall her ringing me and telling me it had gone orange, crying and telling me "It's gone ginger, hasn't it?"' her friend Victoria McCullough told the court. 'I know she had her hair done for the third time and I said it looked really nice but I know she wasn't happy. During this conversation I recall her saying "I don't want to be here" but not for one moment did I think she was suicidal.'
Soon after the texts were sent, Frances went missing, and her phone was found on the dashboard of the Honda Civic, recovered by police close to the location of her body.
The coroner’s report states that there was no evidence of a suicide note, but recorded a verdict of suicide. Deputy Assistant Coroner Terence Moore, said he ‘did not understand’ why Miss Warren’s mood changed so severely in the week before her death. But if it was over her hair, it's seriously tragic.
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Picture: Getty
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.