A collection of Patrick Clancy’s posts from Reddit has come back into view, and they reveal the months leading up to the deaths of his three children. The messages, posted while he was seeking to comprehend what was happening to his then-wife, Lindsay Clancy, show a man reaching out to strangers and medical professionals online for information about symptoms that grew harder to account for.
Clancy posted for support as his wife’s health worsened, and those posts from December 2022 stood out among the deleted material, which ran from 2017 until last year. He reached out for help directly, including questions about thoughts of hurting others.
The Posts That Drew Attention
Clancy maintained an active Reddit presence from 2017 up through last year. The posts he made in December 2022, however, have stood out for special notice. On December 7, he posted in the “Ask Docs” subreddit and explained that he was “posting for my wife.”, using the handle 2022.
Clancy described how Lindsay began taking Zoloft after growing anxious about returning to work as a labor and delivery nurse following the birth of their third child. The shift he noted came quickly once the medication was introduced, he said.
Lindsay is reported to have said, “After a week of taking Zoloft, I developed severe insomnia.”, in a single post. She also noted that she had gone 48 hours without sleep at one point.
“For weeks I have been lucky to get 3 or 4 hours of sleep a night. Oddly, I don’t feel tired, but I know I need more sleep,” the post read.
Two months after starting Zoloft, Clancy reported that Lindsay had dropped 15 pounds, bringing her weight down to 115 pounds. He suspected the medication had never been necessary, and he wrote that Zoloft had actually been his idea.
He also mentioned that Lindsay’s psychiatrist thought she was exhibiting symptoms of bipolar disorder.
Questions About Hurting Others
As December wore on, the Reddit posts grew increasingly alarming. By December 9, Clancy had moved well past ordinary questions about medication side effects, asking instead something far more troubling.
“Has your [medication] experience ever involved thoughts of hurting others, including loved ones?” he asked.
He also asked whether the people experiencing such thoughts had ever felt close to carrying them out, or if they stayed only as thoughts instead.
As Clancy sought to grasp the growing seriousness of Lindsay’s state, the question arose.
A Mild Anxiety Before Medication
A December 6 entry titled “I need another perspective,” relates how Clancy’s worry was not severe before she started taking medicine.
“I can’t stress enough that her anxiety was very mild going into this,” he wrote.
Lindsay was previously eating well, sleeping normally, and socializing, according to Clancy. She had also managed similar anxiety after the couple’s first two children with therapy and coping strategies.
“Was she overwhelmed with the kids? Definitely,” Clancy wrote.
He thought they could have managed it by letting Lindsay have more time to herself, as they had done previously.
That prompted him to pose a question to psychiatrists online: could therapy have helped her instead of medication?
Other Medications and Hospital Care
Clancy’s account revealed that doctors later turned to Ativan and other benzodiazepines, along with sleeping medication, as they tried to manage what first looked like severe insomnia. The Reddit history confirmed Zoloft was not the only drug Lindsay received.
She was also switched from Zoloft to Prozac.
But Lindsay’s condition continued to deteriorate.
According to the information Clancy shared online, by December 15 she was experiencing suicidal thoughts and feeling “severely depressed, numb, don’t really care about anything”.
On that very day, Clancy brought her to the emergency room at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Her condition later led to further treatment.
Doctors in Rhode Island reportedly told her on December 20 that she needed more general psychiatric care rather than being admitted to a postpartum treatment program.
Her treatment at McLean Hospital began on December 30 and lasted through January 5, according to the testimony of her treating psychiatrists.
The Final Post Before the Tragedy
The progression demonstrated how fast the family’s circumstances worsened, moving from worries about going back to work to needing psychiatric help again and again.
Clancy later testified that Lindsay appeared to be doing much better after her release from McLean Hospital.
Before the deaths occurred, the last Reddit post from Clancy stopped mentioning Lindsay’s state of mind entirely. Instead, on January 23, he posted in a technology subreddit seeking guidance on how to build an app for a real estate open house.
The next day, January 24, 2023, Lindsay sent him out to run errands.
During his absence, she used exercise bands to kill their three children.
The victims were Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months.
She first sliced her wrists and neck, then attempted to take her own life by leaping from a second-story bedroom window.
Clancy’s Reddit history therefore ends just one day before the tragedy.
The Trial and the Jury
The mental health issue that plagued Lindsay eventually became one of the main points of debate during her criminal trial. Experts from both sides weighed in on whether she suffered from bipolar disorder, with her legal team asserting that her condition worsened into postpartum psychosis at the moment she killed the children.
Instead of accepting that Lindsay acted without knowing what she was doing, the prosecution contended that she planned the homicide and understood what she was doing when she committed it.
The trial ultimately ended without a unanimous verdict.
Seven days after the start of deliberations, the jury remained split 11-1: 11 jurors were ready to acquit Lindsay on grounds of insanity, while one male juror would not agree. Judge William Sullivan then declared a mistrial.
One woman on the jury told reporters her opinion privately after the trial ended. She said she first thought Lindsay should be found not guilty because of a mental disorder.
What the Reddit History Shows
A husband posted again and again online asking for help as his wife’s mental state grew worse, with direct questions about thoughts of hurting others included among his requests. The deleted Reddit history records him seeking guidance from strangers and medical professionals alike as his family situation grew more severe.
A personal record of a public search for understanding, the posts reveal Clancy seeking information on symptoms that would come to define his wife’s trial.
Key Facts Box
- Patrick Clancy’s Reddit account was active from 2017 until last year
- Posts from December 2022 drew particular attention
- Lindsay began taking Zoloft after returning to work as a labor and delivery nurse
- She lost 15 pounds in two months, dropping to 115 pounds
- She was admitted to McLean Hospital on December 30 and remained until January 5
- The children died on January 24, 2023
- The trial ended in a 11-1 deadlock, with one male juror refusing to find Lindsay not guilty by reason of insanity
A public record of a family’s hardship has been taken down from Reddit. It documents a husband reaching out to strangers online for guidance during a time of personal turmoil.
Source material: “Patrick Clancy’s Deleted Reddit History Reveals What Was Going On Behind Closed Doors Years Earlier,” Bored Panda.
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