Offaly Mum Who Lost her Daughter to Sudden Adult Death Calls for Marathon Runners to Raise Lifesaving Funds
Debbie Carney from Co Offaly was a beautiful young woman looking forward to celebrating her 30thbirthday when her life was cruelly and suddenly snatched away.
Debbie who worked for Ryanair, was at home in her apartment in London in 2012 when she suddenly experienced painful chest pains.
Her mother Sally Carney received a call from her daughter to say she was in a lot of pain- within an hour she was dead.
“At first I didn’t think too much as Debbie always thought the worst when something happened to her medically. I told her to call a cardiac ambulance. She called her friend Siobhan too who went over to her house. After a while, when I didn’t hear anything, I tried Debbie’s phone and I couldn’t get her or Sharon so I called the hospital I was absolutely horrified to be told Debbie had passed away,” said Sally.
Debbie had been sitting on her couch explaining her symptoms to the paramedics when she suddenly closed her eyes and lost consciousness.
“They used the defibrillator on Debbie and rushed her to the hospital but it was too late she was already dead,” said Sally.
Two years later Mrs Carney finds it very difficult to talk about her late daughter.
“It was such a shock, Sally had a cardiac arrest four years previously but they never discovered she had a condition. They told us it was something she took combined with alcohol and her lifestyle but Debbie didn’t even drink at the time.”
Sally said she was overwhelmed by the generosity of Ryanair who in the aftermath of Debbie’s death gave her family complimentary flights over and back to London to repatriate her remains.
“Between the entire family we must have flown about 70 times. It was very generous of Ryanair to accommodate us all like that,” she said.
Lost in grief Sally came across CRY Ireland the country’s leading charity for families affected by Sudden Adult Death Syndrome.
CRY Ireland was set up by Michael and Marie Greene lost their teenage son Peter when he was just 15-years-old to SADS.
Peter had just completed his Junior Certificate and was looking forward to the summer when he became suddenly and acutely ill in the middle of the night and died soon after in his distraught mother’s arms.
Like all parents who lose a child in such tragic circumstances they desperately searched for answers and support. Marie soon realised that there was no real support in this country for people who lose loved ones to SADS and she was determined to do something about it.
She and Michael set up CRY Ireland in 2002 opened a centre for screening in Tallaght Hospital.
Since Debbie’s untimely death her mother has helped raise more than €36,000 for the charity, now she is urging people set to run this year’s Mini Marathon to run it for CRY Ireland.
“I am appealing to anyone thinking of running the Flora Mini Marathon who don’t have a chosen charity to consider running for this worthy cause. CRY is such an important charity as it is saving lives every day by providing screening for families who have lost a loved on to SADS,” she said.
