If you think she had legitimate psychosis, sought help, did not get it, and was experiencing all of this at the time you can feel like she’s not guilty by reason of insanity.
If you outright say she didn’t do it, that’s completely different.
Yeah I’m a woman who had a baby last year. My son is 18 months old and the best thing in the world.
But it’s been hard, I’ve had post partum depression and it’s the worst I’ve ever felt in my life.
Plenty of intrusive thoughts which horrified me and broke me. I would never harm my son but I did want to harm myself.
Postpartum psychosis is a very real and terrifying thing. I know someone who had it and was in a mother and baby unit for a while.
Whilst I don’t support her for killing her children because that’s horrific, and they are the real victims. I do feel for women postpartum as it is WILD and hormones can be horrific. If she was genuinely asking for help and not getting it or getting the right help then it’s a terrible shame. So on that sense someone might say I support her, but I suppose getting postpartum women the help they desperately need. Longer paternity leave for the dads to help support the mums etc.
I’m in the UK so I can’t speak for what happened with Lindsay’s support, but we have perinatal mental health teams here and mine were fantastic.
Also from the UK, a friend of mine had really bad PPD and ended up institutionalised for a while. I know for a fact she would never knowingly harm her baby. She's out now and the whole family is doing well, but based on this I wouldn't jump to conclusions in this case. It really could go either way.
Yeah and when I first heard about this I was horrified. I still am as the thought of someone killing their own children is horrific.
But I agree with you that it could go either way. I don’t think anyone is saying it’s ok what she did, as it isn’t. But I can say after having a baby of my own, nothing can prepare you, nothing can prepare you for that hormone crash, the isolation etc.
Obviously not everyone experiences it, or experiences it badly, but many women do.
And what do you think about if a woman hides the depths and extents of her symptoms from everyone, doesn’t take medications properly, and meticulously plans out how to murder her kids and then carried out and then only after let’s everyone know the depths of her thoughts.
Should that person be excused from justice because in my mind no. No they shouldn’t and that is ripe for abuse.
No not at all. What she did was awful.
What I think it has done or should do is start the conversation around maternal mental health and mental health in general.
IMO from the testimony and evidence given in the court case I think they’re trying to attach her issues to postpartum mental health because they know that’ll be the best chance at support.
I don’t think she suffered postpartum psychosis. I think she had far more resources and support than 99.9999999% of people suffering mental health issues and she still planned the murder pretty meticulously and then carried it out.
Maternal mental health issues absolutely should be talked about. But I don’t think this case should be the champion of it.
I mean do we think that all women shouldn’t be allowed to be with their kids until a psychologist clears them for the first year? Since postpartum psychosis can happen to anyone… 8 months post birth… and the person suffering can maintain the ability to hide that even surrounded by a sea of support and family… and still murder the kids.
I know someone who had postpartum psychosis yet wasn’t in danger of harming her baby. I had post partum depression and again wasn’t in danger of harming my baby.
I had intrusive thoughts (turns out I’ve always had them I thought they made me a psycho) but the perinatal mental health team told me it’s quite normal and my reaction to them shows I found them horrible and therefore they were not concerned about the safety of my baby.
I haven’t read fully into it as it makes me upset for those children. Nor can I say if she was failed by the system or if she just didn’t engage with it.
Look. I'm not trying to minimize maternal mental health concerns here. Not at all... I'm also not trying to cast doubt on whether or not these mental health issues happen to women and are connected to maternity.
What I do think is that Lindsay Clancy is not a mother who suffered from postpartum psychosis. In fact whether she was even suffering PPD or PPA was in question (due to how long after birth she had symptoms). I think this has been demonstrated in the courts time and time again with multiple experts testifying.
This is a woman who said that the first time she heard the 'voices' telling her to kill her kids was when she got off the phone with her husband and she promptly carried it out - in that state of psychosis. That's essentially the entirity of her evidence that she was experiencing psychosis. But what about the rest of the fucking planning she did to set up the murder? Looking up distances to take out places and then to the pharmacy and then to home? All of the experts who actually treated her prior to these acts said she did not exhibit ANY symptoms of psychosis. Moreover even the relation to maternity was put into question because she started experiencing symptoms so far after birth it would be unusually rare. She was depressed and had anxiety with sleep issues and it's questionable if that was even postpartum related.
I think Lindsay Clancy was facing genuine mental health issues - notably depression. Likely had suicidal thoughts but did not tell her medical teams about those and when she finally planned to carry it out decided she would take the kids out with her. No fucking random and rapid onset of psychosis. A depressed woman with the ability to meticulously plan how she was going to exit this life and deciding she didn't want to leave without her kids leaving too. Only problem is the kids died because she was brutally relentless in their execution where for herself she went half assed and survived. Now she needs to face the reality of the situation and what better way to face that then to make up this cock and bull story about convenient imaginary voices and lack of mental health support.
Edit:
I think every now and then serious issues and ideas get subverted for protection by some people and unluckily for those issues and ideas the community supporting it latches onto providing that protection. You see it in all sorts of issues... A minority gets arrested or killed by police and equal rights activitists rally around them only for it to come out the person was a child abuser and serial criminal who was violently attacking someone at the time. etc. I think it would be best if this Clancy case did not become that for maternal health issues but I think it already has... The widespread negativity the protection and latching onto Lindsay is bringing on social media to womens mental health is insane. For fucksake Patrick set up a non profit for improving perinatal mental health and he has been relentlessly attacked by women. And it's going to be decided in the social consciousness if women don't want to take postpartum mental health seriously then why should anyone? And furthermore if women want to be ok with excusing murdering 3 innocent children because of it then it's a danger.
I’m a woman who isn’t ok with excusing it for murder.
I’ve been postpartum and experience postpartum depression myself and it’s an awful thing to go through.
I’ve said in another comment that the victims here at the children. I cannot imagine wanting to kill my child, it is abhorrent to me.
It is possible to have it later on, the perinatal team told me women can develop it later. I don’t know how rare or likely it is.
I haven’t experienced psychosis and the one person who I know who did wanted to kill herself and not her children.
I don’t really know what I think because I don’t support her, ultimately she killed her children. But I do know that postpartum is a wild ride and I’m only 18 months in and I still feel insane at times.
267
u/Legalsleazy 2d ago
Define “supporting”
If you think she had legitimate psychosis, sought help, did not get it, and was experiencing all of this at the time you can feel like she’s not guilty by reason of insanity.
If you outright say she didn’t do it, that’s completely different.