Lindsay Clancy trial: How the U.K. treats postpartum psychosis in Mother and Baby Units

LONDON — Sofii Lewis knew something was deeply wrong within days of giving birth to her first child, Evie, in January 2023.“I just didn’t have a bond with my daughter,” Lewis said.

“I didn’t really want to be around her.” Then the part-time baker became convinced that she or someone else might harm Evie.At night, a beeping sound — like that of a checkout till — haunted Lewis.

She began to fear that someone was going to “buy Evie,” and she became “very suicidal,” said Lewis, who is now 27.She also began to have thoughts of taking Evie’s life, in addition to her own.“I know I certainly was hours, days away,” said Lewis, who lives in Aberdare, Wales.Sofii Lewis pictured with baby Evie."I have no life in my eyes," Lewis said of the photograph.Courtesy of Sofii LewisLewis believes that had she not received treatment within the U.K.’s trailblazing maternal mental healthcare system after being diagnosed with “tendencies of postpartum psychosis,” both she and Evie might not be alive today.

Lewis and other mothers she knows who have experienced maternal mental health struggles have been closely watching the case of Lindsay Clancy, who has been on trial for killing her three children after strangling them in their Duxbury, Massachusetts home in January 2023.Clancy’s defense team has argued that she should not be held criminally responsible for her actions because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis at the time.

“A lot of other mums I’m in contact with who had postpartum psychosis also find it very, very triggering,” Lewis, whose daughter was born the same month that Clancy killed her three children, said of the case.“Because that could have been any one of us who did that.”It was receiving months of care at a Mother and Baby Unit that Lewis says may have saved both her and Evie’s lives.

MBUs are specialist, inpatient units that treat women suffering from mental health issues during pregnancy and after the birth ...