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The Lindsay Clancy trial has renewed attention to postpartum mental illness and psychiatric care.

Postpartum depression, anxiety, intrusive thoughts, and psychosis are distinct conditions.

A frightening thought can require attention without defining a mother’s character or intent.

Fear of judgment or separation can make mothers afraid to disclose frightening thoughts.

As the murder trial of Lindsay Clancy unfolds in Massachusetts, I keep thinking about a journal I wrote seven years ago.

Clancy is on trial for killing her three young children in 2023. Her defense argues that she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and was not criminally responsible. Prosecutors dispute that account.

I don't know what happened inside Lindsay Clancy's mind. Her experience is not mine, and postpartum depression, anxiety, intrusive thoughts, and postpartum psychosis should not be treated as interchangeable.

But I know what happened inside my mind, and some of it still scares me to read: I want to leave. I don't want to be a mother. She was a mistake. And then sometimes, only hours later: I loved being her mother this afternoon.

I could love my daughter and want to escape motherhood. I could........

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