Blogger receives death threats after saying mentally ill friend's death was a 'blessing'

'It sounds horrible to say, but her death wasn’t a tragedy, her life was,' wrote Amanda Lauren

The subject of the blog post had reportedly died falling into a bathtub (PA)

A blogger says she has received death threats for a post she wrote describing the death of a mentally-ill friend as a “blessing”.

The post published on blog site xoJane, entitled “My Former Friend’s Death Was a Blessing,” detailed blogger Amanda Lauren’s troubled relationship with a high school friend who suffered from schizoaffective disorder.

Schizoaffective disorder is a mental illness similar to schitzophrenia and bipolar disorder and can occur only once in a lifetime or recur intermittently, normally triggered by stress.

Lauren wrote the piece after she said her friend Leah (a pseudonym) died falling into a bath tub. She wrote: “It sounds horrible to say, but her death wasn’t a tragedy, her life was.”

The post, which has since been removed, detailed various incidents between the two women including how Leah allegedly once tried to “hook up with a guy” Lauren had a crush on.

On analysing Leah's Facebook profile, she wrote: “While most Facebook posts, at least in my feed, are pictures of engagements, weddings, vacations, children, pets and links, her page felt like the diary of a fourteen-year-old girl with an eating disorder from a Lifetime movie circa 1993.”

“This girl had nothing to live for.”

Stassa Edwards, a writer for online magazine, Jezebel, commented: “Throughout the piece, it’s clear that Lauren is concerned only with herself; there’s no attempt to empathise with a mentally ill woman, no attempt to intervene in her 'former friend’s' clear unravelling.

“There is only Lauren’s concern with herself.”

Responding to criticism and alleged hate mail, Lauren told Gawker: “Maybe if someone is not doing well and doesn’t know how to help themselves and reads that and thinks, ‘Oh my gosh, it could come to this, maybe I should talk to a therapist, or a psychiatrist’.

“I just feel so bad that her life was so filled with suffering and I just hope she’s in a better place. That’s all I meant.”

Lauren has previously been criticised for another post entitled: “Staying Hot For My Husband Is ESSENTIAL To A Successful Marriage.”

On removing the article, the website's editor wrote in a post: “I apologize for an article that was posted here yesterday, entitled ‘My Former Friend's Death Was a Blessing.”

“I deeply regret the hurt that this article has caused and understand that it has perpetuated stigma and diminished the lives of people with mental illness.

“I am committed to immediately reviewing our vetting process to ensure that this experience has a positive influence on the ways in which we at xoJane present all women going forward.”