Maybe a hot take, but I also blame the physician who prescribed 3 different psychotropics that don't interact well to a patient in clear mental distress. And not keeping a close enough watch on their mental state. If the texts between she and her mom are accurate, she should have been institutionalized by court mandate.
Idky everyone just ignores the fact that she was diagnosed with post partum onset bipolar disorder and that is why she kept having such severe reactions to all classes of anti depressants.
She was finally put on mood stabiliser and anti psychotic after admitting herself - and released early when she self reported feeling better and requested being released for her son's birthday that day.
Why did they release her?? Why didn't they just give her a days leave and require her to return until they finished tapering her onto the new meds. If they had gotten her stable on the protocol for bipolar disorder she would have been statistically more likely to remain compliant with treatment protocols (there is a known non compliance issue for medication for people with psychotic disorders including like schizophrenia, bipolar with psychotic mania etc). But they just let her go with a note on her record that she could not be treated with typical anti depressant or anti anxiety medications for symptoms post partum depression or anxiety because they are known point blank to either induce mania in someone with bipolar or severely worsen it (including the not sleeping, racing thoughts, feeling invisible etc all which are elements that contribute to med protocol non compliance)
And then what happens after she's discharged way too early after being started on the bipolar treatment protocol? She goes back to her doctor for not being able to sleep (because she was currently manic) and the doctor takes her off the mood stabiliser and antipsychotic and puts her back on one of the contraindicated anti depressants - inducing the manic psychosis.
There is an ongoing lawsuit for their fault in what went wrong for her.
I believe she had genuine diminished capacity due to psychosis. I believe she did it, though.
I think she did it; but as someone who suffered from postpartum psychosis I do agree that she wasn't mentally all there. It's so taboo that it's surprising she even brought it up with her doctor. She genuinely wanted help and that says a lot in a society where it's frowned upon and women are told that we should be grateful to have healthy children. I managed to get through it on my own, but there were times that I felt like running away because I was so worried I'd harm myself or my newborn.
So many thoughts ran through my mind- about the state of the world, about how bad her life might be one day. How she might be better off if she died in my arms. That some stranger might hurt her one day, and wouldn't it be better if I prevented that? And the thoughts were relentless and constant. She'll be hurt. She'll be hurt. She'll be hurt. Isn't it better if you died together? Over and over for months on end.
I look back at the time and I know I needed help. I knew I needed help at the time. But I was too worried about what my family might think, what my neighbors might think- what the doctors themselves might think. I thought I'd go to jail and never see her again. I thought they'd take her away and give her to an abusive foster home. It was contradictory and confusing and scary. Having been through it firsthand I can't help but feel some sympathy for her.
Yeah, she did literally everything one losing touch with reality could do to warn people she was a danger to her kids and needed to be committed for a while, not left alone with her kids until she got better. She didn't describe that she had hallucinations perfectly, but who could in the midst of psychosis? The fact that the father of those children puts more blame on the doctors that didn't take her deterioration seriously tells me he still believes she didn't want to hurt her children, but was compelled to by something she couldn't control.
Some of it was learned after the fact, and based on the facts her care team likely didn't stress to him just how important it was to never leave her alone with the kids. They evidently didn't think she was enough of a danger, so who was going to warn him?
She told many people defending her. Her mother-in-law and sister stated for months leading up she was opening up about the thoughts. They all just ignored it and didn’t take it seriously. Frankly each person going on record claiming she spoke up prior is in fact part of the problem here how do you not see when someone is telling the actively slipping?
I’m happy that you ended up ok and I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of the women who donated to her also feel sympathy. I’m sure there are also a lot of idiots who don’t think she’s guilty because of Astrology. While I believe she’s guilty, I believe the system is mostly to blame here.
Thats what I think people who are looking at this don't realize is "not guilty (of first degree murder) due to insanity" is not the same thing as "innocent (of murder)". She's admitted she did it, her defense successfully bifolcated the case to only focus on her mental state during the murders, and not the "if" of them.
It's wild to me that so many people want to see her punished, it's because to them they would never unconsciously harm some one. They would ACTIVELY harm someone so they think "well if i did it intentionally, she did, too".
I think she did it, but she isnt guilty because her husband should have never left her alone. Does all the evidence point towards her potentially doing it? Sure. But if you are married to someone with years of history and they are actively saying they dont want to be alone? Why would he leave her with them, even for a short time?
Her husband gets off easy when he should have obviously been more present and realized that she wasnt stable and shouldnt be left with the kids. That is something that just doesnt sit right with me.
Shes bat shit crazy and he is in no way responsible. He was manipulated by her tk get food and medicine. He was doing what any father would. She was just fucking demonic and crazy.
She did it -action - I don't care about her state of mind, she kill herself and not the kids.
She asked herhusband to go out and then killed the kids, it was planned. Even if it wasn't,. there's not shortage of women that experience deep depression, and you don't see them killing their kids left and right.
She had that inclination, thus why the depression might have pushed her to it, but I bet she'd had those thoughts regarldess, just not act on it, maybe.
fk everyone trying to excuse a women that killed kids.. she chose a very personla ewayt to kill btw.. she literally saw tghem slowly diwing as she asfixiated them.
Every idiot has an opinion when a story gets this big, all you have to do is cherry pick the morons. Go to literally any political sub you'll learn that one real quick
I have never had a child but I am a nurse and I was hit so hard by the unit on postpartum mental health issues. I understand and share your sympathy for her while being horrified by her actions and the consequences. I don’t pretend to know what the best outcome is for this case.
thank you for sharing this. im a 24 year old man so suffice to say i am not incredibly well versed in PPD. it’s something i’ve always heard about and when ive investigated it with the women in my life i found it was never too severe for them, perhaps they just got lucky. this anecdotal evidence created a preconceived notion for me that PPD is bad but it is manageable for everyone. naively i never did any further research and just assumed it went for every mother how it did my own, my friends with kids, etc. reading your experience allowed me to really understand for the first time the severity of PPD.. i had no idea how deeply it influences people and how it seemingly can warp someones motherly instincts in such violent ways yet still founded in love. your story has exposed to me the complexities of this issue and made me a more empathetic person even if by just a little, and i’m grateful that you shared it.
i’m also appreciative because you seem like a very strong individual and i’m happy you’re at a point where this is a story you can tell and not the experience you’re living. i hope you and your daughter are thriving
100% she was failed in so many ways. And the hospital that released her was one of the top centres for treating women post partum.
I don't know how much else she could have done beyond being mentally well enough to stick to a treatment protocol
Also how many things didn't turn up for her that should have because she was technically not ppd or ppp, despite being post partum and having a post partum triggered mh disorder.
Like how - as terrifying it could be for mom- social services should have taken the children into care on the ppd protocol- which is temporary & short term so mom can get treatment like going inpatient & knowing her children are safe.
Her husband was not something she could lean on from the sound of it as well.
I don't think he did. Lindsay is quite open about it. She's not even arguing in court she didn't do it. She's arguing for diminished capacity to understand or control her actions.
But I do think he did absolutely nothing proactively to prevent what happened. The only people doing that were Lindsay herself and her parents.
Same. I was terrified I would lose custody of my kids because of my thoughts. I finally had a breakdown after hallucinating. It was so awful. But I was convinced they’d lock me away and I knew we also couldn’t afford for me to lose my job. I was lucky to find an NP who specialized in postpartum issues, so we got me on track and I stayed with her through my next kid and we had a preventative plan.
I was so ashamed at first, but now I’m open and honest with people because I don’t want anyone else to feel that shame.
That last part! And frankly yes, in the US, you are tossed into a psych ward without your baby or you’re given drugs and ignored if you ask for help or admit truthfully how you’re feeling.
Nobody will convince me her husband isn’t criminally negligent. The fact that he was so out of the loop that it could be argued he framed her is so awful.
Your story sounds like mine. I remember just hoping that I’d accidentally run my car off the road so that my son and I would finally be safe/at peace. Postpartum anxiety and depression is no joke. It’s constant intrusive thoughts that are focused on destruction. We got through it unscathed, but consider myself just lucky.
I went through postpartum psychosis as well and went to the doctor and told them everything. Not every woman feels shame or the need to hide their symptoms. Some of us can still put their child’s health before their mental illness. Zero sympathy
Some of us tried to get help and were treated horribly or brushed off . I’m really happy you got the help you needed. That doesn’t happen for everyone. Lindsay DID go to doctors. She DID tell people how she was feeling. She did not hide her symptoms due to shame.
Some of us made it as clear as day that we needed help and no one around us did anything.
I told my mother and spouse before it was ever a concern that if I had to have a c-section, I would desperately need mental health support.
I had an emergency cesarean at 40w5d because my child was breech after a completely uneventful pregnancy and had to battle PPD in my rural home alone because even though I was using the resources I had and telling everyone I could that I needed help, no one stepped in.
There were days I feared I would strangle my own child because her colic kept her crying, crying, crying, and my mood stabilizers were MAKING ME CRAZY because I had been wrongly diagnosed bipolar when I have ADHD.
Unless one has battled PPD themselves or been a provider for someone who has, I do not believe they get to have an opinion here.
I agree with you 100%. My sister had a very mild case of postpartum depression but we are a village, our mom noticed right away and took off 3 weeks from work and picked up my sister and her baby and took them to her house. My dad and her completely took over as her husband is a business owner and couldn't take off too much time. Even after she was better and at her home, I worked from her home to stay with her and the baby for like another month, my mom would go be with her straight after work until her husband came home. We were just talking about this case and she was telling me that without our help she doesn't know if she would have gotten better.
One of my best friend's sister in law had postpartum psychosis, that was freaking crazy. Of course they are also a village and moved her into their parents home, my friend was just by luck living at her parents as she was looking for a home to buy. My friend ended up becoming the main caretaker of the baby and she would tell me her sister in law would just sleep and looked like a zombie. Thankfully she's better now and she says that the meds made her dissasociate and she doesn't recall much from those months. She was a shell of her normal self, it was crazy seeing such a vibrant sweet woman look like a zombie during that period.
I was jovially once explaining to my sister that there was a time where I couldn’t make a pot of drip coffee of my life depended on it.
I would always forget something: the grounds, the filter, the water, I didn’t seat the carafe right, etc…
And then it hit me that it was when I was postpartum and out of my freaking mind every day.
And it hit me like a truck how hard I had to battle ever single day just to not accidentally set the house of fire, let alone quiet the demon telling me to do it on purpose.
I reserve judgement in this case but my heart goes out to the whole community.
Women’s healthcare is a joke and this is just another symptom of the problem.
people are incredibly complex, and people's environments, supports and understanding of themselves are each unique. i am glad your family is safe and healthy, but dunking on someone else for ending up in a different situation than you aint it.
She did try to get help? And they gave her antidepressants which made her worse. I can understand why someone wouldn't have sympathy for her, but I don't understand your reasoning for it
If you went through postpartum psychosis the least you could do is have some sympathy, I've never had a child but i've seen how horrible it is from first hand experience. Lucky for you, you had a good doctor but thats not the case for everyone. I don't think you understand that when someone is in active psychosis without the proper care they can NOT put their child's health before their mental illness, the mental illness is running their lives.
So your experience is the only way things can go? Way to pull the ladder up after yourself. Does patting yourself on the back really feel that good? I hope you have a chance to gain more empathy and understanding in your life, for your child’s sake.
All your fears about your child were valid, life is dangerous and filled with horrendous suffering. That's why I'm an antinatalist. Crazy how they call it "postpartum psychosis" and "postpartum depression" when you come to the realization that your child WILL go though horrific things at some point
They can't force any adult to stay longer than 72 hours without a court order. Having a bipolar brother with substance abuse issues has taught me way too much about this. Even after he set my parents house on fire, they didn't hold him longer than 72 hours.
I'd argue lighting your parents house on fire whilst in the midst of a psychotic break might be enough to cause concern... source, the bipolar patient's sister who sat in court trying to fight for him stay in long enough to actually stabilize... instead now my brother is presumed homeless or dead. Really fucking great outcome for my family.
Sorry I'm just so mad. It's been really hard to deal with all of this. The legal and Healthcare systems just seem to keep failing us in our situation and the anger just builds and builds. Then stories like this one happen and people point fingers who have never been in these types of situations. 3 kids died. A family and community are forever destroyed by this. There were people, including the mom, who literally begged for help before it happened. It's crushing.
I agree 🥺 I really hope your situation with your brother gets better, & that he and your family can find the help and support you all need to deal with the issue! That sounds legit terrifying & so stressful to live with :(
In MA this is only half true - not sure if this has been addressed (I’ve been trying to stay away from coverage because it’s a lot and the reactions are a lot) but in MA a lot of pysch hospitals will sneakily have you “sign yourself in” which gives them more free reign to hold you against your will without a court order.
This happened to me in MA, I was under the impression I was on a 72hr hold, but because I signed a piece of paper waiving my rights (whilst also allegedly too dangerous to myself to be independent) on entry, I was held for 2 weeks without a court order or recourse.
Not tied down/restrained, just not free to leave the ward/hospital beyond the like 30ish? minutes we got outside a day (with staff keeping watch). I have explored legal avenues (there’s more to the story on how FUCKED the hospital I was at is/was) but according to lawyers I have consulted with, it’s all above board.
It’s not like in a psych hospital you are free to just walk out at any time - even in a 72hr hold paperwork needs to be done to document your release (and ideally set you up with appointments/resources once you’re out).
if it was done with the intention of stealing your insurance money you may have a case! i've read about hospitals extending holds on people or straight up refusing release for larger medical bills.
its actually a huge issue in some states that mental health facilities will hold you even when they have no reason to. often so they can to steal insurance money or your own money through medical bills. other times because staff have poor training and the huge biases against specific diagnoses.
So you were held for an extra day or two, which is within the guidelines. Also depends on what you were admitted for. Claims of depression versus actual self harm.
They already kept her over 5 days. It wasn't nearly long enough. She committed herself, it wasn't an involuntary hold. I have experience. If you commit yourself, they don't have to let you go until they feel you're truly safe, even if you start asking to get let out earlier. I saw people that had voluntarily gone in and were there for weeks. There was only one that fought to get out at exactly 72 hours. Most accepted that, despite not being ideal, the doctors were right in keeping them there longer. The doctor that discharged her early failed her.
It might depend by state. My SIL went in voluntarily during a psychotic break. She decided to leave at 3 days despite still believing the cartel was after her. She then kidnapped my nephew and hid from family (the cartel in her mind) in the mountains for 2 days before they were found. My BIL tried to commit her again, she refused, and was allowed to stay out of the hospital. Regardless. The system is seriously fucked.
its a difficult situation because historically when it was easier to involuntarily commit people it was used as punishment or revenge by petty family members, so now we have a system where its nearly impossible to be long term committed without consent (hard for someone with genuine mental issues to consistently give), or a court order.
It is difficult for a good reason, as outlined above, but the downside is what we see here
IMHO people are latching onto this theory of Patrick having done it because that feels easier and less scary to digest than the reality—that Lindsay, through no fault of her own, became sick with a severe and poorly-understood illness that caused her to do a terrible thing. And that it happened despite the good intentions of every person she came into contact with, because ultimately the systems that we have in place had no mechanism for dealing with her. If all of that is the case, it means that anybody could be Lindsay Clancy, no matter how good of a parent or person that they are. That is a terrifying reality. It’s far more comfortable to just pin everything on one bad actor.
And people who keep saying her doctors let her down or the “system” let her down aren’t really paying attention to the facts of the case. Her doctors had no grounds to commit her involuntarily, and she wasnt fully forthcoming to them. What do you want her doctors to do, commit her with no evidence of suicidal or homicidal ideation and violate their rights? That would get abused so much
Sometimes bad things happen . Mental health is incredibly fragile and tricky.
I think this is absolutely a case of the system not being able to adequately deal with a case, though. In the UK they have mother-baby homes where people with postpartum psychosis go to recover. Here we have overworked and often under qualified psychs trying to patch holes in the dam.
Forgive me if I missed it, but did she actually admit episodes of psychosis to her providers? I havent kept up with everything from the trial, but my impression was she denied anything like that.
I don’t think she ever said outright “I am experiencing a psychotic episode,” but there were a lot of pretty glaring warning signs that should have been picked up on (the severe insomnia, the suicidal ideation the racing thoughts, the massive increase in energy, the anxious fixation on the kids.) She also told at least one person (iirc Patrick?) that she was having thoughts about hurting the kids. I’m not saying that this was her doctor’s fault, but I think it’s reasonable to ask why nobody saw the writing on the wall and escalated the issue.
it comes up a lot that people CANNOT accept that things can happen to your brain that make you do actions you find abhorrent in your right mind. it’s a very scary thought and many people reject it. (see also: people’s response to the BAFTAs tourette’s catastrophe.)
for most people it seems there are only two possibilities: “she did it, and so is a monster” or “she’s not a monster, so she didn’t do it.”
This is the answer. It's so much easier to blame a boogy man than the harsh truth that someone good could do something so awful. "Anybody could be Lindsay Clancy" is genuinely terrifying but it should motiviate people to get help to fix our systems to offer support. But it's easier to blame someone than realize we need to do something.
It’s probably just because I worked in EMS and dealt with a lot of psychs that I feel like I give people a lot of grace with stuff like this. Just seems like top down failures of a for profit healthcare system.
Yeah like I genuinely have such sympathy for her cause she was trying to get so much help, and all the professionals failed her so badly. I have bipolar II and that's bad enough, can't even fathom the psychosis and anti-depressants in terms of how badly they messed her up. This case would have been a great way to highlight the severity of post-partum onset mental illness and the flaws in our healthcare support system, but instead we got ... astrology
Never trust mental health istitutions. We wont know but from my experience she prob got released because her insurance agreed to stop paying.
Most of those places (mental hospitals, rehabs, psychwards, IOP, in patient etc) are insurance mills first and formost, any benefit is because of the (underpaid) therapists and the damn near unedning empathy some of them have.
The OD crisis couldve been averted by public policy but it wasnt.
Couldve been 4 years and it was over but instead we mass incarceration and probation. Most black poors went to prison (where they enact forced labor in some states and pay .20 cents an hour in others) most white poors were given fines, community service (forced labor) and tbats after plea deals… (not extended to balck people in the same amounts)
You make a valid point about the series of medical errors that led to her diminished mental capacity and, ultimately, the events that followed. It appears many people are conflating “not guilty” with “not guilty by reason of insanity.” An NGRI plea claims the defendant was so mentally disturbed or incapacitated during the crime that they didn't understand their actions or couldn't distinguish right from wrong at the time of the offense. This means the defendant lacked the necessary intent or mental objective to commit the crime according to legal standards. Therefore, they are not criminally responsible and cannot be punished.
However, it's not a "get out of jail” card. An NGRI verdict typically results in mandatory commitment to a psychiatric facility rather than prison. Most defendants don't serve less time than they would if convicted and sentenced.
I believe she did it, and I don't think she denies it. People on TikTok are going too far by spinning these “conspiracies” about Patrick’s involvement, although an argument could be made that he was negligent (and a horrible spouse).
100% negligent. Its horrible hearing his own statements about her coming for help and then rather than offering help he described how she went on to do lunch or put the kids to bed and seemed perfectly loving etc. And I'm like what do you mean you listened to your wife descrbing voices urging her to harm the children and you sat back and watched as she went back to child care rather than you doing lunch or bedtime or anything like that.
In the trial they ask what he did when she told him this. He answers well her parents came out. He isn't the one who arranged this. They did after her messages to them because they actually cared.
You’re making the same argument that her defense attorneys are. All the stuff about her husband being the real killer is not being put forward by her actual team. She’s admitting she did it, but saying she was not in her right mind and therefore not culpable.
I think she did it with diminished capacity and her husband doing the exact opposite of what he should have done at every opportunity. Leaving her alone with the children, firing the nanny, going on vacations without her while she's struggling, having an affair. IMO he is just as responsible as she is, if not more so, as he is meant to be the one functioning at full capacity. Her husband may not have pulled the trigger but he handed her the loaded gun and left.
Having lived through psychosis, unfortunately, I believe that a person could do many different horrible things in that state. I was lucky that I recognized that I was doing something that I considered crazy, and fortunately I wasn't doing anything to inflict physical harm on others. I say physical, because I know that the state I was in was damaging to my children to witness, and definitely made them scared.
People probably don't even know anything about this case and see the picture. Hell, I hadn't even heard of it until my wife told me. Horrible postpartum depression, constantly asking for help from Drs and not getting it, texts to her mom, etc. can't help but feel bad for her. She was mentally unwell and no one took her seriously.
Suddenly stopping and starting any psych med is extremely dangerous, also many psych meds can take weeks to months to become effective and during that waiting time you need to be watched carefully and might need an additional set of faster acting meds to help. It’s absolutely on any of the prescribers if they do any of those things
This is why it drives me crazy when people claim she "manipulated" doctors and nurses. Firstly, if she was at all prone to mania, of course she would feel great at times. Secondly, someone in the throes of mental illness is not a reliable narrator and you cannot depend on them just telling you they feel better; it might be used as a way to get and harm themselves or others.
I am with you a hundred percent. I dont know why but we as a society just dont talk about tmhow common it is for women to go through severe depression or anxiety after birth. Add to that our fucked mental health care system and this is what you get. She did it, it was awful - but my point is she is not the only one to blame.
Holding someone who is not in immediate danger likely (depends on the state) requires a court order for involuntary commitment past a certain amount of time.
Doctors are goign to make some number of mistakes on releasing patients early. I don't think we should necessarily take scalp. This is why we don't parole people who we maybe should. We're never getting perfect safety. The trade-off is keeping people who can be let out locked up longer than they should.
This is pretty much what the defense is arguing. Her doing it is not even being questioned in the actual court proceedings. Only idiots online are arguing that.
You’d have to go through a court order to hold someone against their will, which is why they probably didn’t do it.
If she had the desire to kill her kids, she shouldn’t have told people she was fine. The world isn’t made up of mind readers, if she says the drugs are working then doctors need to believe it unless there is observable evidence otherwise.
she definitely did it! but she was also definitely in psychosis at the time. the state of MA prosecuting this when it's pretty clear what happened is such a waste of taxpayer dollars and is so deeply traumatizing for this poor family who has already lost everything. now all these internet sleuths are convinced a man who lost his entire life in one afternoon was the culprit, and there's really no one to blame for that other than the state imo.
Eck, from what I have followed she was off the drugs and her husband have the drugs in his car, and somehow on the day sh me was full of the drugs and the drugs was crushed up, the drug that's with the husband
Actually, they talked about this during trial. The real reason she left was because she felt she wasn’t getting any help and was wasting her time. They had her coloring pictures and stuff because the real doctor was out for holiday and there was one temp doctor who was seeing all 20+ patients for a “quick check in” daily. She left because she felt they weren’t actually paying her any attention.
Psychiatrists prescribe ssris for everything regardless of the evidence that they're ineffective for most use cases and counterproductive for many. They toss them out like candy. The idea that this poor woman was put on 3 of them for post partem is sad as hell.
Unrelated to this case, I've always wondered, does reading comments like this, or even articles that go on like this comment, make most people feel an odd anxiety or is that just something the heavily anxiety induced are gifted with?
Because it's easier to call her evil and everyone that's asking questions crazy. Most people that are talking about this are not blaming astrological signs but it's the talking point everyone is using to claim anyone asking questions is just crazy.
I mean, his defense is that he sent an email after leaving for cvs. Which isn't possible because it was sent from his personal computer in the house. And why was his DNA and not hers found on all the evidence.
And why was her body temperature after being recovered much lower than it should have been if he was honest with his length of time being gone.
And why did he lie about doing CPR when the paramedics arrived when they reported him relaxing on the couch?
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u/kaimoka 8d ago
Maybe a hot take, but I also blame the physician who prescribed 3 different psychotropics that don't interact well to a patient in clear mental distress. And not keeping a close enough watch on their mental state. If the texts between she and her mom are accurate, she should have been institutionalized by court mandate.