Why are people more sympathetic to Lindsay Clancy than Andrea Yates? (Child death mentioned)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The other thing is that NONE of us have access to her medical records. We have no idea what was going on. She was on an anti-psychotic. This was not garden variety post-partum depression.

I agree with the PP about Seroquel, but I think it's also worth agreeing with this PP that "garden variety postpartum depression" is usually treatable with ONE antidepressant and weekly therapy. Maybe Zoloft doesn't work well and you try something else. Maybe you do a group instead of an individual therapy appointment. But either way, "garden variety" PPD doesn't require 12 different medications over 7 months, inpatient hospitalization, intensive outpatient therapy. That amount of treatment indicates A CRISIS in this family. There is an attitude on this thread that someone somewhere should have done something differently. Realistically, it doesn't always work that way. This was a person who had a ton of resources, knowledge, and support. She was engaged with a lot of treatment. Maybe she was overmedicated, it definitely happens, but sometimes it also happens that the intensity of someone's mental health problems is just so severe that all the treatment in the world can't prevent tragedy from happening.

Almost all the meds she was on were for anxiety and sleep - not depression.

She posted she had a bad reaction to Zoloft. She was trying to find a med that worked well, and was not successful clearly.

[Anonymous]

The meds she was on at some point since October. I am not sure if anything has been released about what she was on when or in what combination or how regularly or for how long she took these meds. I read somewhere she was on 3 medications at the time of the murders but I don't know if that is true.

Klonopin (clonazepam), Valium (diazepam), Ativan (Lorazepam) Zoloft (sertraline), amitriptyline, Remeron (mirtazapine), Prozac (fluoxetine), trazodone, Lamictal (lamotrigine) and Seroquel (quetiapine fumarate), buspirone, hydroxyzine and Ambien (zolpidem).

This does look like primarily anxiety and sleep issues - although the combination of those two issues can greatly depress ones mood as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The other thing is that NONE of us have access to her medical records. We have no idea what was going on. She was on an anti-psychotic. This was not garden variety post-partum depression.

I agree with the PP about Seroquel, but I think it's also worth agreeing with this PP that "garden variety postpartum depression" is usually treatable with ONE antidepressant and weekly therapy. Maybe Zoloft doesn't work well and you try something else. Maybe you do a group instead of an individual therapy appointment. But either way, "garden variety" PPD doesn't require 12 different medications over 7 months, inpatient hospitalization, intensive outpatient therapy. That amount of treatment indicates A CRISIS in this family. There is an attitude on this thread that someone somewhere should have done something differently. Realistically, it doesn't always work that way. This was a person who had a ton of resources, knowledge, and support. She was engaged with a lot of treatment. Maybe she was overmedicated, it definitely happens, but sometimes it also happens that the intensity of someone's mental health problems is just so severe that all the treatment in the world can't prevent tragedy from happening.

Almost all the meds she was on were for anxiety and sleep - not depression.

She posted she had a bad reaction to Zoloft. She was trying to find a med that worked well, and was not successful clearly.

She posted Ativan was the only thing that worked but it was addictive so she didn’t want to stay on it. Sometimes I think there are worse things though. My mom was on a daily very low dose of Klonopin from about age 35 until she passed away. I’m convinced it saved her even though non-psychiatric doctors were always shocked we told them she took it and had been for 40+ years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The meds she was on at some point since October. I am not sure if anything has been released about what she was on when or in what combination or how regularly or for how long she took these meds. I read somewhere she was on 3 medications at the time of the murders but I don't know if that is true.

Klonopin (clonazepam), Valium (diazepam), Ativan (Lorazepam) Zoloft (sertraline), amitriptyline, Remeron (mirtazapine), Prozac (fluoxetine), trazodone, Lamictal (lamotrigine) and Seroquel (quetiapine fumarate), buspirone, hydroxyzine and Ambien (zolpidem).

This does look like primarily anxiety and sleep issues - although the combination of those two issues can greatly depress ones mood as well.

I don’t understand how someone can look at this list of meds she was trying to try to feel like herself again and determine it’s more likely she is just evil and hated her children than she was deeply ill after this pregnancy something we know is very possible in the postpartum period and although she was functioning her brain was obviously not working the way it normally did and she had a break.

If you read accounts from other mom’s who have had psychosis many report similarly sounding “fine” to others while not feeling really in control of these moves on the inside.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The other thing is that NONE of us have access to her medical records. We have no idea what was going on. She was on an anti-psychotic. This was not garden variety post-partum depression.

I agree with the PP about Seroquel, but I think it's also worth agreeing with this PP that "garden variety postpartum depression" is usually treatable with ONE antidepressant and weekly therapy. Maybe Zoloft doesn't work well and you try something else. Maybe you do a group instead of an individual therapy appointment. But either way, "garden variety" PPD doesn't require 12 different medications over 7 months, inpatient hospitalization, intensive outpatient therapy. That amount of treatment indicates A CRISIS in this family. There is an attitude on this thread that someone somewhere should have done something differently. Realistically, it doesn't always work that way. This was a person who had a ton of resources, knowledge, and support. She was engaged with a lot of treatment. Maybe she was overmedicated, it definitely happens, but sometimes it also happens that the intensity of someone's mental health problems is just so severe that all the treatment in the world can't prevent tragedy from happening.

Almost all the meds she was on were for anxiety and sleep - not depression.

She posted she had a bad reaction to Zoloft. She was trying to find a med that worked well, and was not successful clearly.

She posted Ativan was the only thing that worked but it was addictive so she didn’t want to stay on it. Sometimes I think there are worse things though. My mom was on a daily very low dose of Klonopin from about age 35 until she passed away. I’m convinced it saved her even though non-psychiatric doctors were always shocked we told them she took it and had been for 40+ years.

True. Again, mom worried a med could be addictive, trying to find solutions, committing herself to inpatient. These things do not align with the plotting evil killer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Personally, I think she was a regular mom who had debilitating PPD after her 3rd child that turned into postpartum psychosis. It makes zero sense to me that she would commit this crime, in this way, if she was thinking rationally.

I think all the people insisting that she did this because she's an evil person are afraid to consider the possibility that an otherwise normal person can do something like this when suffering from a severe mental illness.

Disagree. Sociopaths and narcissists exist and people who insist she is mentally ill are afraid to consider the possibility they can be manipulated and fooled by such people.

Yeah, she really put one over on me by completely destroying her own life

I’m not talking about her specifically manipulating you, but people like you are easy targets for narcissists in general because you deny it even when it’s staring you in the face. I’m sure she’d be overjoyed there’s fools out there who consider her a victim whose life has been destroyed. She’s happy her kids are gone and she’s already looking towards the future. Her first written words when she woke up were “do I need a lawyer?”

Looking toward a future paralyzed and in prison?

Makes no sense.

She won’t be in prison if she gets off on insanity or some other “overmedicated” defense. Other child killers have gotten off, why can’t she with the best lawyer $ can buy? She probably won’t stay paralyzed after PT either. I think we’ll see an increase in child murders honestly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m very concerned to hear that McClean Hospital discharged her after only five days inpatient. That is far from ideal standard of care of post partum depression requiring inpatient treatment. When I used to be a prosecutor and I would commit patients involuntarily, I was always shocked in following the cases to see how quickly they would street people who were seriously mentally ill, but that was the state hospital. I once put a guy there whose family cut him down from a tree and revived him, he was dead but they restarted his heart with CPR, a miracle really. He was cognitively intact but obviously suicidally depressed and the state hospital discharged him in a week with SSRIs. SSRIs take weeks to reach full efficacy. But that’s our mental health system in this country.

I just don’t think this woman murdered her children with mens rea formed in a sane mind.

Ah, this picture explains everything. Y’all see a white woman hugging her kid and relate to her. That’s the reason for all the mental gymnastics to defend her and “she couldn’t have plotted to murder those kids!” UMC white women everywhere are scared to death that one of them could just be a cold blooded killer and not a victim of mental illness and a failed healthcare system. Perpetual victims..

[Anonymous]

I don't understand how she was not diagnosed with postpartum depression or anxiety, yet she had suicidal ideation and an infant at home. What ruled it out as PPD/PPA and made it GAD instead? Also, she had a terrible reaction to zoloft. SSRIs can trigger mania and even psychosis in people with bipolar disorder. At any rate, her mental health sounds complicated and ambiguous. I made the mistake of watching the arraignment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Personally, I think she was a regular mom who had debilitating PPD after her 3rd child that turned into postpartum psychosis. It makes zero sense to me that she would commit this crime, in this way, if she was thinking rationally.

I think all the people insisting that she did this because she's an evil person are afraid to consider the possibility that an otherwise normal person can do something like this when suffering from a severe mental illness.

Disagree. Sociopaths and narcissists exist and people who insist she is mentally ill are afraid to consider the possibility they can be manipulated and fooled by such people.

Yeah, she really put one over on me by completely destroying her own life

I’m not talking about her specifically manipulating you, but people like you are easy targets for narcissists in general because you deny it even when it’s staring you in the face. I’m sure she’d be overjoyed there’s fools out there who consider her a victim whose life has been destroyed. She’s happy her kids are gone and she’s already looking towards the future. Her first written words when she woke up were “do I need a lawyer?”

Looking toward a future paralyzed and in prison?

Makes no sense.

She won’t be in prison if she gets off on insanity or some other “overmedicated” defense. Other child killers have gotten off, why can’t she with the best lawyer $ can buy? She probably won’t stay paralyzed after PT either. I think we’ll see an increase in child murders honestly.

And for what, exactly? To live out her life as a notorious child killer, hated/feared/pitied by all those who used to love her? She could have just run away, or faked a car crash, or a million other things, if her goal was just to be free from her kids

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend had a post partum nervous breakdown at six months after weeks of insomnia triggered by baby sleep struggles. She tried to go on fmla but her boss forced her to quit instead with threatening action letters because she said she had ‘already taken too much maternity leave.’ This is the society we live in that tells moms they are too big a burden until some moms say ok i get it, I’m worthless, I will just kill my kids and myself. Which of you who are so disgusted or outraged at her has founght for universal maternity leave? Which of you has lobbied for safe affordable subsidized daycare? Or adequate (first world) maternal medical care? You are the disgusting ones, desperate to see a public lynching while this very minute there is an exhausted mom in the verge of crisis with no one to turn to. You are handmaid’s tale characters. Your righteousness is blasphemy.

This is dumb. You sleep train. Put the baby to bed at 7 and go back in at 6. That’s all it takes.

That’s why it’s hard for a manager to have empathy for a woman who is voluntarily getting up for a six month old baby.

Yeah I wonder if this plays a role in PPD too. I had a subordinate who was constantly complaining of complete exhaustion but was getting up 3, 4, 5, times a night with a 9+ month old baby (after taking 6 months of maternity leave) because she and her husband didn't let the baby cry, ever, for even a second, for any reason. The baby had never fallen asleep on his own in his entire life. I mentioned to her that we had sleep-trained our kids and they slept 12 hours a night at her baby's age (younger actually) and she looked at me like I was some sort of child abuser. The baby is now over 2 and I still don't think he sleeps well at all and she's still sort of a zombie.

I had 2 babies who were STTN 7-7 by about 4 months old (minus the occasional regression) with very little effort to sleep train. And then my third baby humbled me and had only STTN a handful of times by 9 months. Her room was right next to the older kids’ rooms so I couldn’t leave her to cry loudly for extended periods without waking them (which would then extend the time of getting everyone back to bed). And every time we found a long weekend or some break where we thought we could try some form of sleep training, the baby would get sick and we didn’t have the heart to let a sick baby cry. Our nanny even tried to help us get her on a better sleep schedule, but it took a full year to get some semblance of normal sleep.

Only in America would blame a mom of an infant for being tired because she should just be shutting her young child in a room for 11 hours and ignore their crying, so that she can prioritize work instead. We are a stand out this way in the industrialized world, caring more about workplace productivity than caregiving for babies.

Seriously? Tell me what they do in Italy. Sweden? Syria? Kenya? Peru? You don’t really mean to argue that there is a strict procedure that all new parents in those countries use to help young mothers get their babies to sleep that we, because we are Americans, refuse to use here. Babies cry and parents suffer in all countries. Babies die by their mothers’ hands in all countries. Stop blaming horrible things that are a dark part of the human condition on policy. It’s not always policy. This woman had all the leave, medical support, and family support that one could hope for. You’re seriously telling me that she would’ve been better off in any other country? She was sick. Sicker they she probably even knew. She was trying. Her family was trying. Mistakes were made. But it is not because of America’s policies. Sh!1t happens. In this case. it happened to an affluent white woman so you can’t blame America.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m very concerned to hear that McClean Hospital discharged her after only five days inpatient. That is far from ideal standard of care of post partum depression requiring inpatient treatment. When I used to be a prosecutor and I would commit patients involuntarily, I was always shocked in following the cases to see how quickly they would street people who were seriously mentally ill, but that was the state hospital. I once put a guy there whose family cut him down from a tree and revived him, he was dead but they restarted his heart with CPR, a miracle really. He was cognitively intact but obviously suicidally depressed and the state hospital discharged him in a week with SSRIs. SSRIs take weeks to reach full efficacy. But that’s our mental health system in this country.

I just don’t think this woman murdered her children with mens rea formed in a sane mind.

Ah, this picture explains everything. Y’all see a white woman hugging her kid and relate to her. That’s the reason for all the mental gymnastics to defend her and “she couldn’t have plotted to murder those kids!” UMC white women everywhere are scared to death that one of them could just be a cold blooded killer and not a victim of mental illness and a failed healthcare system. Perpetual victims..

I just don't understand how you can read this story, including that she was by all accounts a great mom prior to being hospitalized with severe mental health issues after birth of her child, and decide that the most rational explanation is that she was in fact a cold-blooded killer pretending to be a normal, loving mom for years while waiting for her moment

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m very concerned to hear that McClean Hospital discharged her after only five days inpatient. That is far from ideal standard of care of post partum depression requiring inpatient treatment. When I used to be a prosecutor and I would commit patients involuntarily, I was always shocked in following the cases to see how quickly they would street people who were seriously mentally ill, but that was the state hospital. I once put a guy there whose family cut him down from a tree and revived him, he was dead but they restarted his heart with CPR, a miracle really. He was cognitively intact but obviously suicidally depressed and the state hospital discharged him in a week with SSRIs. SSRIs take weeks to reach full efficacy. But that’s our mental health system in this country.

I just don’t think this woman murdered her children with mens rea formed in a sane mind.

Ah, this picture explains everything. Y’all see a white woman hugging her kid and relate to her. That’s the reason for all the mental gymnastics to defend her and “she couldn’t have plotted to murder those kids!” UMC white women everywhere are scared to death that one of them could just be a cold blooded killer and not a victim of mental illness and a failed healthcare system. Perpetual victims..

I just don't understand how you can read this story, including that she was by all accounts a great mom prior to being hospitalized with severe mental health issues after birth of her child, and decide that the most rational explanation is that she was in fact a cold-blooded killer pretending to be a normal, loving mom for years while waiting for her moment

+100

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how she was not diagnosed with postpartum depression or anxiety, yet she had suicidal ideation and an infant at home. What ruled it out as PPD/PPA and made it GAD instead? Also, she had a terrible reaction to zoloft. SSRIs can trigger mania and even psychosis in people with bipolar disorder. At any rate, her mental health sounds complicated and ambiguous. I made the mistake of watching the arraignment.

Providers make mistakes. Sometimes a lot of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand how she was not diagnosed with postpartum depression or anxiety, yet she had suicidal ideation and an infant at home. What ruled it out as PPD/PPA and made it GAD instead? Also, she had a terrible reaction to zoloft. SSRIs can trigger mania and even psychosis in people with bipolar disorder. At any rate, her mental health sounds complicated and ambiguous. I made the mistake of watching the arraignment.

Providers make mistakes. Sometimes a lot of them.

Where did you see she had bipolar disorder?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m very concerned to hear that McClean Hospital discharged her after only five days inpatient. That is far from ideal standard of care of post partum depression requiring inpatient treatment. When I used to be a prosecutor and I would commit patients involuntarily, I was always shocked in following the cases to see how quickly they would street people who were seriously mentally ill, but that was the state hospital. I once put a guy there whose family cut him down from a tree and revived him, he was dead but they restarted his heart with CPR, a miracle really. He was cognitively intact but obviously suicidally depressed and the state hospital discharged him in a week with SSRIs. SSRIs take weeks to reach full efficacy. But that’s our mental health system in this country.

I just don’t think this woman murdered her children with mens rea formed in a sane mind.

Ah, this picture explains everything. Y’all see a white woman hugging her kid and relate to her. That’s the reason for all the mental gymnastics to defend her and “she couldn’t have plotted to murder those kids!” UMC white women everywhere are scared to death that one of them could just be a cold blooded killer and not a victim of mental illness and a failed healthcare system. Perpetual victims..

I just don't understand how you can read this story, including that she was by all accounts a great mom prior to being hospitalized with severe mental health issues after birth of her child, and decide that the most rational explanation is that she was in fact a cold-blooded killer pretending to be a normal, loving mom for years while waiting for her moment

I think there is a lot of space between “none of this was her fault whatsoever” and “she was a cold blooded killer who plotted and planned this.” A lot of space. And that is where the truth is.