EXCLUSIVE
A mother who drowned with two of her children in a Sydney river was struggling so much with her mental health that she sent her one-year-old son to live with her parents in Vietnam.
Hoai Doan, 32, died with his eldest children Mitchell and Hazel, aged seven and five, on Saturday morning when they became trapped in a strong current in George’s River, near Shearer Park in Lansvale.
Passersby tried in vain to rescue the family by jumping into the river and in boats, but emergency services recovered the bodies from the water several hours later.
Police are investigating how the family ended up in the water, and it is being flagged as a possible murder or suicide. Daily Mail Australia revealed how the troubled mum had battled bipolar disorder.
The children’s father, Dinh Nguyen, confirmed that his wife took medication for her condition, but that it was not always effective.
Now her friend Anh Ha has told Daily Mail Australia about the true nature of Ms Doan’s mental health battle, including suicidal ideations and desperate attempts to control it.
Ms. Ha explained that their families used to go fishing and spend time together in the same place where they drowned.
Anh Ha is pictured, left, with Hoai Doan during a day at George’s River in Lansvale. On Saturday, Mrs. Doan and two of her children died at the same location.
Hoai Doan is pictured with his son, Mitchell, left, and a friend, fishing off the George’s River pier.
Hoai Doan, pictured dressed in pink, and two of her children, Mitchell and Hazel, died on the dock on Saturday.
She said their last conversation was last Thursday, two days before the tragedy, when Doan said she was worried about her health and finances.
“I wanted to call her to see how she was doing, because she was taking mental health treatments,” he said.
“She was in and out of the hospital, so I wanted to talk to her and ask if she was okay.
“She said, ‘I’m very worried,’ because she didn’t know how she would make money and she was worried about her children’s future.”
Doan’s youngest son, Macario, has been temporarily living with his grandparents in Vietnam because raising three children on one income, combined with his bipolar disorder, had been too difficult for the family.
Despite Ms. Doan’s clear concerns about her future, Ms. Ha, who is a massage therapist, thought she seemed sensible and rational during that conversation, and wanted to try to help her.
“I told her I could teach her how to do massages and I could book clients for her, and she was very excited and looking forward to it, but I told her to wait until I got back from Thailand,” he explained.
“I said I would do it free of charge and her husband supported me.”
She had no reason to think Mrs Doan’s situation was urgent, so she decided to spend her final days in Sydney with her own young children before her eight-day trip to Thailand.
Pictured: Floral tributes left at the spot where Mrs Doan and her children died on Saturday.
The family was part of the local Vietnamese community in south-west Sydney.
Vietnamese Hoai, 32, and her two children Mitchell and Hazel Nguyen, aged seven and five, (pictured) drowned in the Georges River on Saturday.
On Saturday, Ms. Ha was out with her children when a friend called her to tell her about the tragedy.
Despite speculation about whether the situation was a murder-suicide, Ms. Ha maintained that her friend would never intentionally hurt her children if she were in her right mind.
She didn’t think the children knew how to swim and wasn’t sure why they would have been in the water.
“He was a lovely person, very loving, he loved his children very much and wanted to give them the best care, but I also think he can’t control himself,” she said.
“People with mental health problems can’t control themselves, but in her heart she didn’t want this to happen either.”
Ms. Doan did everything she could to stay healthy: she didn’t eat fast food, she was enthusiastic about healthy eating and nutrients, and she dreamed of becoming a motivational speaker.
During mental health episodes, Ha said her friend talked “a lot” about how she didn’t want to live.
“People with mental health problems need a lot of love and understanding,” she said.
Hoai Doan is pictured with a copy of Anthony William’s book in November 2022, which he found on his fourth hospital admission.
Police are reportedly investigating whether the tragedy was a murder-suicide. In the photo, Mitchell and Hazel with their mother’s supplements.
Emergency services rushed to the boat ramp at Shearer Park off Hollywood Drive, Lansvale, on Saturday.
“It’s not about telling them what to do, I’ve heard a lot of people telling them they were being negative and telling them how to be, but they don’t need that, they need understanding.”
Doan ran a discount store for about a year, but it closed in 2022.
Daily Mail Australia previously revealed a series of social media posts Ms Doan published that same year, detailing her interest in holistic healing following several hospital stays.
His efforts to address his mental health issues appeared to rely heavily on a book called Brain Saver by a self-described “medical medium,” Anthony William.
In one post, a family member told her not to give up, to which she responded, “God doesn’t let me die easily.”
William, who does not appear to have a medical degree, maintains that his medical expertise was given to him by a spirit when he was four years old and that his connection with that entity allows him to cure illnesses, ranging from minor to serious.
The book promises to provide readers with “answers to brain inflammation, mental health, OCD, brain fog, neurological symptoms, addiction, anxiety, heavy metals, seizures, Lyme disease, ADHD, Alzheimer’s, autoimmune and eating disorders.
Ms. Doan’s posts, written in Vietnamese and translated into English, revolve around her hospitalizations and how she began consuming “heavy metal detox shakes” and drinking honey lemonade to improve her condition.
In 2022, she wrote about a time when she “lost control on the street and was taken away by an ambulance,” only to be released the next morning.
