This is really a difficult situation, and one which I would have an extremely hard time actually knowing what to do.
The trauma of losing a child is ranks up there in terms of psychological shock. In our support group for fellow parents who had lost children, mostly babies, there were members who really had a difficult time moving on. No one in that group was actually responsible for the death of their child, which would have been far, far more devastating.
I can believe in the psychological damage of the brainwashing presented in the OP, especially after that level of trauma. It would simply be unbearable to be responsible for the death of one’s child, and much more so for having directly killed her, even with the mitigating circumstances under which she acted.
The field of recovery from extreme PTSD is an example of the limits of what is known about psychological therapy. I had been finally making some progress after more than a decade of counseling when we lost our child. That put me back into a downward spiral which wiped out the years of moving forward.
I’m well past losing the child, but I cannot fathom how much worse it would be if I had actually been responsible for the death of him. My batshit crazy younger brother actually accused me of that at the time from his reaction to the death. Even though I knew he was crazy, even simply having someone bring up the suggestion was enough to deeply disturb me.
Esme needs real help, which is very had to find. Therapy helping people recover from trauma is much more an art than a science. For many people, the trauma just doesn’t go away, despite years of therapy. Not everyone recovers.
I don’t know enough about Lamar Odom to know how much his turbulent upbringing and the death of his child were contributing to his self-destructive behavior, but it’s an unfortunately common reaction.
If Esme were really lucky, she may find someone she can work with, but there isn’t a wide range of professionals with experience working with this type of situation. I’m not optimistic about her chances.
It may be possible that after years of work, she could recover sufficiently to be lead to the truth, but a sudden revelation could kill her, either directly leading her to suicide or driving her into revenge, blind enough to take stupid risks. Any gains she’s made recently would be wiped out and it would be much, much worse than before.
There’s no way good way to play god here. This is a level of psychological damage which far exceeds the levels ordinary people ever experience or come into contact with.