Diary entries reveal postpartum struggles as trial of Massachusetts mother continues
During the murder trial of Lindsay Clancy, diary excerpts detailing anxiety, insomnia and postpartum psychosis were read, while prosecutors argue the killings were intentional.
A Massachusetts jury heard passages from Lindsay Clancy's diary as her murder trial resumed, shedding light on the mental health challenges she described in the months before she strangled her three children in 2023. The entries detail overwhelming anxiety over caring for her newborn, insomnia, feelings of "brain fog" and a desperate need for a mental break.
Clancy's defense maintains she suffered from postpartum psychosis, a rare psychiatric condition that can distort reality, and that her bipolar disorder was not fully diagnosed until after the deaths. Prosecutors contend she acted with intent and should be held criminally responsible for the deaths of the children, who were aged eight months to five years.
"I want help. I want to be well," her attorney read from a journal page.
"This is not a public debate about women's mental health and how the medical system treats women," prosecutor Shanan Buckingham said in an opening statement.
The diary also records Clancy's worries about breastfeeding, her newborn's sleep schedule and a sense of disconnection from her family. According to a lawsuit, clinicians prescribed various antidepressants, sleep aids and an antipsychotic during the three months before the killings, but her symptoms of insomnia, anxiety and confusion persisted.
Legal filings allege that health providers failed to recognize her risk to herself and her children, a claim the providers deny. After a brief stay in a postpartum depression program and a short psychiatric hospitalization on New Year's Eve, Clancy returned home, resumed psychiatric appointments, and the day before the murders reportedly heard a commanding voice urging her to kill the children.
The trial also featured testimony from her ex-husband, who described finding the victims in a blood-stained bedroom and basement, and from doctors who recounted the infants' medical conditions after the incident. If convicted of murder, Clancy faces life imprisonment without parole; a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity would result in commitment to a state mental health facility.