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Megan Cliffel vividly remembers when she first heard the name Lindsay Clancy. I had just given my first written interview about my own experience with postpartum psychosis in early January 2023, actually to a small nonprofit in Massachusetts. Megan's a writer, a mindfulness teacher, and a maternal mental health advocate. A couple weeks later, the woman who interviewed me and said, I'm not sure if you've seen the news, but your interview is going to be way more timely than we thought. The news was that Lindsay Clancy was accused of murdering her three young children, strangling her five- and three-year-olds and her eight-month-old baby.
She then tried to kill herself, and remains paralyzed from the waist down after jumping from a second-story window. Clancy doesn't dispute killing her children, but has pleaded not guilty, offering an insanity defense after suffering from postpartum psychosis. Her trial over whether she is criminally responsible begins closing arguments this week. Lindsay Clancy's defense team rested its case Friday, this after several days of testimony about her mental state before and after she strangled her three young children. The defense's last witness was Dr. Philip Resnick. That's the very same psychiatrist who testified in the trial of Andrea Yates. There's no doubt that Clancy was in extreme distress. In the four months before her children's deaths, she saw multiple medical providers, was prescribed 13 psychiatric medications, and spent five days getting inpatient care. But what is so gripping about this trial, and the reason I called Megan, is the way it might, might.
have cracked open some hidden conversations about postpartum mental health. I agree that in some ways people, it feels like it might be this moment where we have like a system reckoning on maternal mental health. And I am deeply hopeful that that's true. I will also say, you know, one thing that I'm kind of skeptical about as an advocate is... I, again, when I was labeled with postpartum psychosis, I was like, oh, we just need to kind of tell the world about it and kind of naive. And then when I became an advocate, I was sitting on a call with a bunch of fellow advocates. I served on Postpartum Support International's task force around postpartum psychosis. And I got a little curious about somebody on the call and I ended up Googling. And an article from 1987, written when I was six in the LA Times, outlined all of the exact problems that still exist today and was calling for inclusion of the illness in the DSM. And so that's some 40 years later. So I agree that it feels to have broken through. And I am also skeptical while hopeful that we take this moment as a chance.
for real change. Today on the show, Lindsay Clancy and our reckoning with postpartum psychosis from someone who's been there. I'm Lizzie O'Leary, in for Mary Harris, and you're listening to What Next. Stick around. Welcome back to Fresh Matters, where we discuss matters of freshness. I'm the grossier here with Kat from Metro. Kat, your produce is impeccable. We have high standards. We... Meat is custom cut on site to my very delight. Yep, it's important that we... And the baked goods? More like baked grates. Fresh in store every day. So at Metro you would say fresh. Matters? It does! Find fresh meals and deals at Metro!
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Understood the big bet. Find us on CBC Listen or wherever you get your podcasts. I'd like you to tell your postpartum story. You wrote an incredibly moving piece for Slate about it. Where do you start that story? I'd start that story saying, you know, I honestly had a great maternity leave. It was unpaid, but I was relaxed. It was my second child. So I kind of had like this knowing of how to meet her needs and not be so worried about every little thing. I went back to work at three months postpartum. At about four months postpartum, that's when I started to not feel like myself. And I was able to language that to my husband. What did you say? Like, how did you describe it?
I literally said, I don't feel like myself. And I was only able to honestly see that by kind of getting away from our everyday lives. We had gone away for the weekend to visit his parents. And he said, what do you mean? And I said, I feel anxious and a little bit sad. And we had agreed that if I felt that way in two weeks, I'd go see somebody. But we were two working parents in New York City with like two small children, a dog.
very demanding jobs. And so we kind of kicked the can down the road. I never went to see somebody despite not feeling like myself. And to be honest, not feeling like myself kind of became the new normal. I wasn't sleeping well, but I was performing at work. My kids were well. You know, it all looked good on paper until December 4th, 2015, when, you know, after work, I stepped onto the subway and I suddenly kind of went from not feeling like myself to believing I was being followed. And that actually that was deeper than that. The entire city was surveilling me. Yeah, you described making that like fleeting eye contact you make on the subway with someone where you're just like acknowledging another person's presence. But to you, it was something much, much darker.
yeah you know you step out of the subway it's a new person on the subway everybody looks at me but for me when everyone's eyes went on me i was like oh my gosh they're all looking at me they're watching me they're not just watching me i'm being surveilled and it was wild how quickly kind of my brain which um was kind of working logically, but in a totally deluded reality. So from that moment on, I am like, okay, people are out to get me, but I can't let them know that I know that they're out to get me to give me a chance to get out of this. And so I kind of continue on as planned. I'm changing trains, but I'm like removing this bright orange hat I have on. It just keeps on getting more and more terrifying until I end up at a gathering of a bunch of colleagues, which is where I was going. And a friend says to mine who'd organized the gathering.
who's watching June and Millie or two girls. And at that moment, I think, oh, this isn't just like an innocuous old gathering of friends. This is a recruitment event. And she's letting me know that if I don't join, my children will be killed. Are you comfortable telling me what happened next when you went home?
Yeah, sure. So, you know, we've got two little kids. We don't get out much because we've got two little kids. My husband actually has been away for work the past few days. And so this is his first night back. Thank God he was back. And he believes I'm going to go meet up with some old friends. And I, as soon as, you know, I believe she's threatening the lives of my children, I kind of picture them at home being killed. So I, you know, make up the first excuse I can to get out of there. I walk, run through the streets of the Lower East Side. I basically throw up in our apartment door. My husband Colin is there with our two little girls.
And he says, why are you home? And instead of like, why are you home? Like you were able to go out with friends. I take why are you home as in he's in on it and that he wanted me to join this recruitment effort. And so from that moment, he is an enemy to me and I am keeping everything I believe I know inside while I assess like, who's he more loyal to me and the girls or this thing that he's implicated in, how deeply is it implicated in it? And so.
From that moment, it's probably about 6.30 on a Friday until 10 a.m. on a Saturday when I'm handcuffed by the NYPD and taken to Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital. I am kind of in a battle with him. And it's the first kind of like a mind game, me trying to figure out how to get out of it alive while I'm opening the windows in December in our apartment to release what I believe is a poisonous gas being emitted by our rattling fridge. And I'm turning over how to get out of there alive. And then in the morning, I just am no closer to figuring out how to escape. He goes to get the mail and he comes back with a book that has a phrase, this is required, reading on it from Tony Morrison.
world to me and i thought it was literally like the first required reading of the cult you know and then he hands me an s magazine he's starting to send some things off with me he's like go relax and read this i try and read the magazine but the loose talk section become like quotes that are about me and threatening me and i'm just like throwing the magazine call and tell me what's going on and at some point he starts to realize i'm unwell um he's reticent to call 9-1-1 because he doesn't want it to jeopardize my custody of the kids but at one point he calls my friend and she hears me kind of banging and she's a social worker she said listen if you're afraid she's gonna hurt her kids or yourself you've got to call 9-1-1 and so he does How long did it take you to kind of stabilize after that incident? Yeah, so the weird thing is, is like, I thought people were coming to get me. People come to get you, right. I don't think they're the NYPD. I don't think I'm in an ambulance. I'm begging these EMTs, like, please are either of you moms. My kids are dying back there. I wake up on a twin bed in the dark and I don't think I'm in a, you know, inpatient unit at Bellevue. I think I've been captured and that my kids are still.
alive potentially and if they are i've got to figure out a way out to save them so i try to escape from the hospital a couple times thankfully i'm met with shots in the arm to you know sedate me um and so that goes on for a few days i'm admitted on a saturday and it's probably a tuesday or wednesday when my husband's just like desperate teary behind his eyes like trust me meg there's no cold you're in a mental hospital in manhattan take the medicine and then this woman who likes that she's a psychiatrist says like if you um stop trying to escape and you start behaving um you can see your kids again and i say i need that written down And she wrote it down and it may have been on like a tiny posted, but I was like, OK, like maybe I can see them again. And that at that point when they that evening, when they came around with the medicine card, I like went out willingly and took the two pills in there, which was lithium and risperidol. And then taking those consistently starts to kind of reattach me to reality. But then it's kind of like the beginning of the next chapter of a very painful journey of realizing it was all in my head. Prior to having postpartum psychosis, had you struggled with your mental health?
No, I mean, you know, I'd had blue days like anyone and, you know, little things like that and times when I was anxious or whatnot, but I had never been diagnosed with a mental health condition. So I had no previous kind of like official mental health history. Now I think of mental health as like a continuum of like, I'm having a bad day till like I'm in it, you know. I can't get off the floor. Exactly. And I think we all actually have like days like that. But no, from our kind of the way our system categorizes things, I had no previous mental health history to speak of. How much did you know about postpartum psychosis before it happened to you? Nothing. I'd never heard of it.
Really? I mean, you're such a you are a smart, educated woman with resources. It is kind of stunning to me that even on a second pregnancy, you didn't know this could happen. I had no idea. What does that tell you?
It tells me that our health care system is not set up to care for women. And that, you know, now what I know is maternal mental health conditions are the most common complication of childbirth, one in five. You know, postpartum psychosis is less likely. It's one to two in a thousand. But what I now know is that we actually know this is a predictably risky period for women and families. There's no other period in someone's life when we can predict you're going to have a mental health issue with such precision as in the postpartum. And yet our system is not designed to kind of turn towards people in that period of their life. It's actually kind of like.
you know, have the baby and then see you in six weeks. Whereas those first, you know, the weeks before you're being monitored like all the time checking on the baby. And so it tells me that the system is not oriented around actually women and families. It's oriented around like successfully getting the baby out. And we have to change that. I have such a strong memory of, I think the way I described it to my husband was feeling like a vessel. Oh, yeah. And my son is six now, but going to some of those pediatrician appointments and, you know, you're doing the baby stuff and then there's like a form to check. It's like, are you feeling sad? Are you?
I was someone who, you know, I've been on antidepressant for a long time. And even I felt like I couldn't check. Yes, I'm struggling with, you know, feeling sad with anxiety. I knew you're supposed to get the form and say you're fine. And I.
I ask you about this because you talk about this in your piece for Slate saying that like you had, you know, a Midwestern Catholic upbringing just like I'm fine is a part of how you were raised. Yeah, 100 percent. I also I don't know about you, but there's just like not enough texture in those forms to describe how I'm feeling. So it's like, you know, it's just I'm getting chills right now talking about it. It's just so inadequate to capture what a gigantic experience it is in the biological identity, mental health connected shifts that are going on, you know, hormonal and the form just kind of just can't even capture it.
The thing I would say is like, I went on to have a third kid, right? And risk of recurrence for me was one in three. And at that point, I was like, so in a good way, entitled to my own wellness and also like knew how important it was to be able to talk about everything that was going on because I didn't want my thoughts to go from kind of normal to deluded. And I'm a threat to myself and my family as they had in a number of hours before. And so that time, you know, I had a reproductive psychiatrist and I could say to her like, you know, I saw a speaker the other day and it was near the baby. And I thought, oh my gosh, what if that speaker fell and hit the baby? And then my next thought was like, what if I grabbed the speaker and hit the baby with it?
And I would share another thought, like looking at her like, does she think I'm a shameful mess? And she was like, okay, yeah, these are intrusive thoughts. And I think like 80% of women have them. And then it's very common. Oh, I have a very strong memory of being awake at, I don't know, three, four in the morning and feeling like, well, should I throw myself down the stairs? And writing to a friend and she said, why don't you go take eight hours and sleep? And just having someone who had already had two children say that to me, like, that's a thing. Take some time, sleep. And then waking up feeling like, oh.
Oh, OK. It was so stunning. Yeah. I wonder what kind of response you got to the piece you wrote for Slate. I mean, I know you do this work now professionally. You talk about this. Yeah. But what did readers say back to you? I have gotten so many lovely comments, just like women feeling really, really seen. And one.
one particular i mean many of them have struck me like women are like i am crying reading this like thank you so much um but one thing that really struck me is this woman she's like i am almost 80 and like reading your piece kind of like released me from you know these kind of feelings and things that i've had and the shame that i had and i just was like oh my god so much time has gone by for this woman her kids are in their 50s and they're she's they're okay and she's been holding on to this and um that kind of thing is makes me feel like oh god we have to do so much better in normalizing the range of things that can happen for women. So one, we can get good standard care, but also just not be carrying this around for so many years. I will say, Lizzie, this is kind of funny, but of course there have been some trolls on my article too. And it's funny to watch the women go support, you know, go combat the trolls. And one man said, you women are sick with some terrible emoji. And I didn't respond, but I wanted to be like, literally. So we agree. We just want good standard health care. So it's been wild to watch the responses, but mostly really positive. We'll be right back after a quick break.
Welcome back to Fresh Matters, where we discuss matters of freshness. I'm the grossier here with Kat from Metro. Kat, your produce is impeccable. We have high standards. Meat is custom cut on site to my very delight. Yep, it's important that we... And the baked goods? More like baked grates. Fresh in store every day. So at Metro you would say fresh. Matters? It does! Find fresh meals and deals at Metro!
I mean, I think one of the things that... that made me want to talk to you was also watching this sort of online phenomenon around the Lindsay Clancy trial. I mean, any, look, we are in this sort of true crime era, any crime story, and I'm sort of saying that with air quotes, will have this huge online life, almost separate and apart from the actual facts of a case. But this seems much broader and deeper. Why do you think it has awakened so much passion?
You know, it's so true. Like I literally was at like a store the other day and I mentioned doing advocacy work and this woman was like, oh, do you think the husband did it? And a friend also said that to me. And every time somebody says that, I am frustrated. And also, you know, I've watched friends go from kind of the comfort of the sleuthing and the intrigue with it and say that even to me. And I say back to them, no, I don't think he did it.
She did it. She said she did it. And she was very, very sick when she did it. And I believe she had the same illness I had. And what I watch in that moment is people go from kind of comfortable sleuthing and judgment to tears welling up behind their eyes and like sitting with this heartbreaking reality that a woman took the lives of her three children. And so at least how I look at it is like it's comfortable to like be in a sleuthy true crime place. It's deeply uncomfortable and horrific to sit with the reality of what happened.
But I think this is a moment where we kind of collectively as a nation need to sit with this heartbreak and let it break our hearts and ask, like, how did we get here? And and then get to work really building a system that cares for women and families. I mean, I may have a very jaundiced view here, but I tend to think that progress in women's health is often only made after a horror story. What are the things that you and your work have seen that help, that give people the ability to get the care they need? The system is not set up to support us, but there have been wonderful people who are trying to build support in a lack of a public system that does that. One huge organization to shout out is Postpartum Support International. They have links to providers that are versed in maternal mental health. So you can find somebody who actually knows their stuff. There's free resources. There's free online support groups. I'm actually facilitating one later today. I volunteer for them for women who've been through postpartum psychosis. So that's an area of promise. There are also there's a newly formed North American Board of Reproductive Psychiatry that's actually creating or trying.
to create board exams in reproductive psychiatry, which is essentially a test that future psychiatrists would need to take to assess their knowledge of mental health conditions related to being a woman. There's also a free curriculum that was created around reproductive psychiatry by some of the leaders in the field for those psychiatrists that are already out there who realize, wait, I don't know my stuff. They can actually take this free curriculum. There are other efforts trying to get postpartum psychosis into the DSM. Those are stalled and taking way, way too long. But those are some of the kind of points of glimmers I see out there. And yet we have a long way to go. One of the things that I'm curious about is...
just where really structural stuff comes into play, right? Lack of paid family leave, the kind of frenzied exhaustion that comes from trying to do it all at once. Do you think any of this is making those bigger conversations happen? Or are we so tangled in the online world of like, well, her husband said X or Y that we're not able to have those conversations? I hope so. I mean, every time I'm talking about it, I'm talking about the fact that I had three children and I've never had paid leave. And that's not OK. And that work stress was part of what created, played a part in my postpartum psychosis. And it sounds like from what I've read about the trial, that work stress was a key factor for Lindsay Clancy as well. So I hope so. But I don't know. You know, there are great people working on like paid leave for all and whatnot. But I've also seen stuff, you know.
go up to be looked at by our federal government and then also be, you know, nothing come of it. So I hope so. I think it's shining a light. Will it actually create change? I'm unsure. My colleague, Sachi Kool, wrote a story about the trial and everything around it. And I'm really been sitting with one of the things she said, which is if this woman, with her many privileges, we should know Lindsay Clancy was an L&D nurse, couldn't get adequate medical care to save her and her kids. And if the state would rather incarcerate her than get her the care she needs, what hope is there for the rest of us? Yeah, you know, it's so...
I told my husband, I'm like, it's weird that the state is like, you know, the prosecution is coming from the state and the system. But in my opinion, the system is to blame. So it's like the system is weirdly defending itself in this case, you know, and there's something wild and twisted about that to me that feels a bit like the witch trials. Like it's like there's this setup for women and the system doesn't treat any of us well. And of course, if you are not, you know, if you're not white and you don't have access to resources, it does far worse for you. But there's something wild about kind of the system putting all these resources.
sources into prosecution, but not actually putting the proactive resources in place. To me, that feels a bit like sinister, honestly. Megan Cliffel, thank you so much for talking with me. Thank you for having me, Lizzie. Megan Cliffel is a writer, mindfulness teacher, and maternal mental health advocate. She recently wrote an article for Slate about her experience with postpartum psychosis and has written a forthcoming memoir about her healing from the experience.
And if you or anyone you know is in crisis, please call, text, or chat with the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting TALK to 741741. And that is our show for today. What Next is produced by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharm, and Patrick Forte. Paige Osborne is the Senior Supervising Producer for What Next and What Next DVD. Mia Lobel is the Executive Producer of Podcasts here at Slate. And Ben Richmond is the Senior Director of Podcast Operations. I am Lizzie O'Leary, and for Mary Harris, you can find me on Blue Sky. I'm at Lizzie O'Reilly. Thank you so much for listening. Talk to you soon.
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