The Lindsay Clancy case has generated critical discourse on motherhood that is particularly painful and difficult to swallow. What happens when the mother that society expects to care for everyone else loses the capacity to care for herself?
Clancy, a Massachusetts mother who stands accused of the murder of her three young children in 2023, is currently undergoing trial. Her defense teams argue that Clancy was in the throes of postpartum psychosis. During the postpartum psychosis era, mothers can suffer from postpartum mental issues, anxiety, suicide, and other debilitating conditions. The defense also argues that Clancy was in grave psychological distress.
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Clancy’s case should not be used to draw comparisons with typical parenting stress and psychiatric breakdowns, and the case should not be used to defend the killing of her children. However, there are some legitimate concerns about motherhood that the case brings up, which are usually brushed under the rug, such as…When did putting yourself last become the new first rule of motherhood? For mothers of neurodivergent and disabled children, this question gets even trickier.
When motherhood is a 24/7 role
Becoming a neurodivergent child’s mother is a full-time job, and often, a lifelong academic and research-based position. The mother has to learn the signs of a meltdown, learn about all of the causes of sensory overloads and which noises will cause that overload, about the foods the child will not eat, the actions that may cause anxiety to the child and perhaps even the words that may be causing anxiety. And this list of the mother’s responsibilities is not even the half of it.
It’s the 20 therapy sessions, the reports, the meetings (via WhatsApp of course) the assessments, the follow-ups, and the mother finally getting her rest. Maybe.
The mother has to do all this while preparing her child’s food, getting her child to and from school, getting her child dressed and making sure her child does their homework, keeping the house in order, and having a job to afford to live.
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Research has documented higher stress in these mothers and an increased occurrence of anxiety and depression beyond what any neurotypical parent suffers. The mother has to be strong- because she’s the mother.
Anxiety that is hidden
Many special needs parents are dealing with different anxiety levels throughout the day- Will the school call me today? Will my child have a meltdown? Will the teacher complain about my child again? Am I doing the right amount of therapy? Should I try some new interventions? What if I make the wrong choice? Of course, the hardest and scariest one is; What will happen to my special needs child when I am no longer here? This question will torment special needs parents for the rest of their lives
When every problem is the mother’s fault
Special mothers try their best to hide this feeling, but there is an added burden they don’t often talk about; the feeling of taking on responsibility for everything. If meltdowns are happening, then of course mother didn’t do enough to prepare her child. If the child still can’t socialize and is still anxious then of course, she didn’t get the child right therapy. She didn’t create enough structure, etc. etc.
The list never ends.
And somewhere along the way, the mother can disappear behind the role of caregiver. She becomes the person who remembers everyone’s appointments but forgets her own. The person who knows exactly when the next therapy session is but cannot remember the last time she sat quietly with a cup of coffee.
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The person who advocates fiercely for her child at school meetings but feels guilty asking for one afternoon for herself. The person who is constantly told to be strong, but strength should not mean exhaustion.
The invisible identity loss
Motherhood already demands an enormous adjustment in identity and for parents of children with additional needs, that adjustment can be even more intense.
The mother who once had a career, hobbies, friendships, travel plans, ambitions and a life outside parenting can slowly become known primarily as someone’s mother. Her conversations revolve around therapy, school, milestones and appointments.
Her social media feed is filled with parenting information, Her phone contains therapist numbers, her calendar belongs to her child’s schedule. And when someone asks, “How are you?” she may instinctively answer with an update about her child.
You don’t have to become the perfect parent
Perhaps one of the most damaging expectations placed on special parents is the idea that they must try everything.
Every therapy, every programme, every dietary suggestion, every developmental activity, every new expert, every recommendation from another parent, every viral Instagram post promising progress, but parenting is not a competitive examination.
There is no prize for being the mother who attends the most appointments. There is no guarantee that the child receiving ten therapies will necessarily do better than the child receiving three carefully chosen interventions. And there is certainly no evidence that a mother must sacrifice her entire identity to be a good parent.
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Sometimes doing enough really is enough.
For a special parent, self-care cannot simply mean a spa appointment once a year, It can mean something much more fundamental: It can mean saying no, It can mean refusing to attend every school meeting that does not require your presence, It can mean changing a therapist when the relationship is no longer working, It can mean accepting that your child may not reach the milestone another child has reached, It can mean leaving a WhatsApp group that makes you feel inadequate, It can mean refusing unsolicited advice, It can mean having dinner with friends without discussing therapy, It can mean returning to work, It can mean taking a holiday.
It can mean reading a book that has absolutely nothing to do with autism, ADHD, disability or parenting, It can mean laughing without feeling guilty, and sometimes it can simply mean saying: “Today, I am not going to fix anything.”
There are parents who chose themselves — and their children benefited too
Across the neurodivergent community, there are countless parents who eventually discover that protecting their own identity does not mean abandoning their child, It means creating a healthier family.
Parents who return to work often discover that they become happier and more confident advocates, Parents who stop chasing every therapy sometimes find that their children benefit from a calmer home, Parents who accept their child’s differences rather than constantly trying to “fix” them often begin noticing strengths they had previously overlooked.
And parents who build a life beyond caregiving teach their children something equally important: That their mother is a person too.
The mother must be allowed to remain a person
The Lindsay Clancy case is an extraordinarily tragic and complex story, and the courts will determine the legal questions surrounding her case. But the wider conversation about maternal mental health should not end when the headlines disappear.
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Mothers should not have to reach a breaking point before someone asks whether they are okay. And special parents should not have to prove that they are exhausted before they are allowed to rest. Perhaps the healthiest message we can give mothers is not “You are your child’s entire world.” Perhaps it is: “You are your child’s mother. But you are also you.”
