Karen McCarron, 38, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of obstructing justice and one count of concealment of a homicidal death in the 2006 death of her daughter Katherine.

In the approximately 60-minute statement taped May 15, 2006, two days after the alleged killing, Karen McCarron says she had 'wanted a life without autism.'

'Autism left me hollow,' she says in the statement taped at the OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria. McCarron was being treated for an attempted overdose of an over-the-counter medication.

'It seems that everything I tried to do didn't help her. She was a tough nut to crack,' McCarron says of her daughter on the tape, which was played Tuesday in Tazewell County Circuit Court. 'I didn't know what to do. She was not learning at a rate I would expect.'

As McCarron watched the tape Tuesday at the hearing, she became visibly upset, rocking back and forth and wiping tears.

In the confession, McCarron, who appears calm, says that she killed her daughter at her mother's house and then drove the body back to her own house. McCarron describes how she then took a shower, bought ice cream and returned to her mother's house to retrieve the plastic bag and dispose of it.

The next day McCarron allegedly overdosed on the medication, authorities said.

Police said they found a suicide note written by McCarron in a Bible on the bathroom floor.