A new mum accused of causing brain injuries when she smashed her two-month-old daughter onto a nappy changing table has been seized by police.
Suspect Clarissa Nicole Stewart, reports local media, then searched the internet for `Shaken Baby Syndrome’ hours rather than call for paramedics on Wednesday, 15th November.
When she eventually took the baby to the Hendrick Medical Plaza, in the city of Abilene, she at first told medics she was worried because the baby was “twitching and not acting right”.
Stewart is reportedly suspected of suffering from severe postpartum depression.
Text messages between her and her husband show her mental state was extremely disturbed.
One message reads: “I want nothing to do with [the baby] when you’re off. I can’t stand her anymore the second she cries, it throws me into a rage I didn’t know I could have.
“It’s getting harder and harder to love her. Honestly, don’t want to pump [breast milk] anymore because of her. I don’t want that connection anymore.”
Postnatal depression affects around one in every 10 new mums within a year of giving birth.
Sufferers are said to have anxiety, trouble sleeping, difficulties connecting with their baby, mood swings, exhaustion, and a sense of despair.
After she turned up at the hospital, within moments, medics realised the baby had suffered a massive head injury and called the police, a probable cause arrest warrant states.
Doctors said the infant suffered a subdermal haemorrhage, bleeding in the area between the skull and the brain,
She also had bruises on her torso and the area around her eye, reports local media.
Medics helicoptered the baby 150 miles away to Cook Children’s Medical Center in Fort Worth where surgeons were due to perform emergency brain surgery before she died.
Police say Stewart and the newborn’s father were unable to account for any of the victim’s injuries.
During an interview with police, Stewart reportedly confessed to shaking her daughter and then slamming the baby onto the changing table.
Stewart is also said to have confessed to police that she didn’t seek medical help for six hours.
Instead, she searched for ‘what are symptoms of shaken baby syndrome’ and ‘why is baby sleeping more than usual’.
She also looked up ‘how long for shaken baby symptoms to appear’ and ‘why is my two-month-old shaking’.
Stewart was arrested on Wednesday, 29th November, and charged with one count of injury to a child, a first-degree felony, court records reportedly show.
She is being held on a USD 100,000 (GBP 79,247) bond at the Taylor County Detention Cente, according to jail records.
