KITCHENER — A woman sobbed on the witness stand Monday as she recalled her two teenage sons pushing her into the upstairs bathroom of their Kitchener home and trying to drown her in the bathtub.

"I looked in the mirror and thought it's the last time I'm going to see myself alive," the woman testified at her ex-husband's trial on charges of attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder. "I was saying no, no, no …"

She said her 11-year-old daughter was also in the bathroom during the 2007 attack, leaning against a wall with her hands in her pockets.

The prosecution alleges the children's father, who had previously been married to their mother, coached the kids to kill her. He was convicted in 2010 and sentenced to 12 years in prison.

The ex-husband is being retried after his conviction was overturned by the Ontario Court of Appeal, which said the trial moved into dangerous territory when the prosecutor painted the father as a "Jesus nut."

Neither the father nor the mother can be named to protect the identity of their children.

On Monday, the mother testified her sons — one 16, the other 14 — and her daughter had been acting strange after their father moved out and she filed for divorce in the fall of 2007. They became convinced she wanted to kill them. She testified she loved them and had no plans to hurt them.

The woman said her children's behaviour worsened — with the youngest son trying to pour liquid ant poison into her coffee and the eldest stabbing her in the arm with a fork — in the weeks leading up to the bathroom attack.

She said the attack on Nov. 30, 2007, began shortly after she told them to get ready for bed. "No one did. They were not listening. My gut was saying something is very, very, very wrong here tonight."

She said that while she was beside her bedroom door, the 14-year-old son made a "signal" to the 16-year-old and told him, "I go one side, you go the other."

She said she backed into her bedroom. The youngest son "grabbed me on one arm and one leg," the woman testified. She said the eldest son grabbed her other limbs and the two dragged her out of her bedroom.

"Then they just shoved me into the bathroom. And then the door closes."

She said both sons remained inside with her as water poured into the tub.

The woman testified her eldest son put her in a headlock and both moved her toward the tub. She was on her knees beside the tub when the youngest son told his brother to "push her head down," the woman testified.

She said she could not break free. The water in the tub reached a depth of about eight inches (20 centimetres), she said.

The woman said she managed to get on her feet, stepped into the tub and cried out to her daughter to call 911. She said the youngest son said, "Don't do it." The woman said her daughter acted as if she didn't hear her cry for help.

The woman testified she tried to convince her children, in a soft voice, to have a talk in the kitchen.

"Let's talk in here," the youngest son replied, later adding, "I know you want to kill us and I don't want to die."

She said she told him she loves all her children and did not want to kill them.

The woman said she managed to get out of the bathroom. The youngest son said he was calling the police. The woman's daughter was now sitting at a table praying.

The woman said the eldest son apologized and said he loved her. She said he told her to tell the police "nothing happened."

To her surprise, the woman overheard part of the conversation her other son was having with the 911 operator: "And now she's coming after me."

General Crown counsel Fraser Kelly asked the woman what happened when the police arrived. "I was the one who was arrested," she said.

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The woman testified police questioned her for several hours, then released her with no charges. They also questioned the children, who are back living with their mother.

Earlier on Monday, court heard a chilling audio recording the mother secretly taped four days before the attack. In the conversations, between her and her children, the daughter sound maniacal. She accuses her mother of wanting to kill her. The mother says that's false.

"Shut up and die — now!" the daughter replies.

She also refers to her mother as Hitler and says, "I'm living with the devil here."

The daughter again says she believes her mother wants to kill her. Then the daughter talks about killing her mother, saying "Oh my God, that is a lot easier."

The mother testified she had earlier heard her children say "we could make it look like an accident" by burning down the house with her inside.

She said the more the children saw their father — who was living a few blocks away at his parents' home — the more bizarre their behaviour became.

The woman said her ex-husband also exhibited bizarre behaviour and abused her when they lived together.

In spring 2007, while she was taking a bath, he appeared in the bathroom with an extension cord that was plugged in. She jumped out of the tub.

"He was demanding I go back into the bathtub. I was terrified what the extension cord could do if it hit the water."

She said she begged him to leave, and he eventually did.

On another day he grabbed her by the neck and choked her, she said.

The woman said she was afraid to call the police. She said he once told her: "Nobody is going to threaten me with the police. And, you f---ing bitch, you better sleep with your eyes open tonight — I am going to kill you."

The judge-alone trial continues on Tuesday.