A SPANISH woman found dead in January in the Avon Gorge was 'depressed over Brexit' and fearing she would be deported, according to her friends and housemates.
Carer Miriam Macarrón Arroyo, 42, went missing on January 5 this year and was found four days later in the ravine near Bristol, UK.
Although her depression had other causes – including no close family links besides her mother in Madrid, suffering chronic pain which made her job intolerable, and struggling to make ends meet – including receiving letters from the Inland Revenue demanding money – one of Miriam's major issues was what would happen to her after the UK left the European Union.
She had lived in the Bristol area for 12 years and had no desire to return to Spain, but could not afford the process needed to become a British citizen and was scared she would be ordered to leave, especially amid recent government speculation about how foreigners would be required to earn 35,000 a year to guarantee their stay, and firms having to justify why they employed non-British staff for jobs a UK national could do.
“Miriam really felt as though she fitted in here, but Brexit was really worrying her,” said Clare Tidman, who shared a terraced house in the bohemian, multi-cultural district of Easton, Bristol, with the deceased.
“I don't think she suffered any racist abuse personally; it was more subliminal,” Clare told British broadsheet The Guardian in an interview.
“She felt it – the media is very powerful. She felt the message was that people like her were coming over here and taking jobs away from the British. Overall, she felt less welcome in the country.”
Her friend Yoko Earley confirmed 'Brexit, her job and health' were making her 'depressed'.
And according to Miriam's doctor, she was 'frustrated at always feeling ill'.
Miriam's friend Eleanor Jones, who saw her on Christmas Eve, said the Spanish woman was 'at her lowest ebb ever'.
And she concurs with the other close friends in Miriam's circle that the deceased was 'one of the most caring people' she had ever met.
“She was able to sympathise with people and their problems, but it was a source of frustration to her that people didn't empathise with her own troubles,” Eleanor told The Guardian.
Miriam is said to have had a large network of friends of numerous nationalities and various cultures, enjoyed music and socialising, particularly in the Old Market area where she and friends often went to the bars – one of which hosted a memorial service for her in January, which was overflowing with friends and close acquaintances.
Clare concluded that 'everyone really loved her' and that they were all struggling to come to terms with her death.
Miriam did not leave a note before she went missing, nor did she contact anyone, but the coroner said there was 'no conclusive evidence of suicide' and that she could just as easily have suffered a fall.
Her friends have no idea what to think.
After moving to the UK aged 30 in 2005, Miriam had been a kitchen assistant in the Priory mental health hospital, carried out care work in people's homes, and had lately been working at a residential nursing home in Westbury-on-Trym, a middle-class borough of Bristol.
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