“It’s not all about hormones,” Walsh said in a subsequent post, expounding on the original idea. “It’s also about a life that suddenly doesn’t revolve around you anymore.”

PPD affects at least 1 in 8 women in the weeks and months after having a baby, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Unlike so-called “baby blues,” in which anxiety or fluctuating emotions subside within a week or two of delivery, PPD symptoms are more intense and include brain fog, extreme sadness or anger, or guilt and feelings of failure.

Postpartum psychosis, on the other hand, is a severe condition including delusions, mania, and deep depression, and it can quickly become life-threatening if left untreated. Clancy, being tried for the strangulation of her three young children, is resting on the defense of postpartum psychosis after saying she struggled with depression, anxiety, and intrusive thoughts of harming her children months before the crime took place in 2023.

Some women are criticizing Clancy for using a mental health defense to clear her of culpability for murder, as her case has attracted an intense following on social media.

Postpartum issues enter the political conversation

Some GOP women argue that not taking maternal mental health seriously could jeopardize the party’s standing in the November midterm elections, as well as the campaign to win the presidency again in 2028.

Meghan McCain, daughter of the late Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), lambasted Walsh and others for “scaring the normies” with the debate over the reality of PPD, saying average women will be crucial for the GOP in the next two elections.

“As one of the few women left in conservative media who isn’t trying to live a trad wife life or peddle trad wife content – a lot of you sound so weird and mean talking about fertility, pregnancy, post partum,” McCain posted on X.

Postpartum depression versus postpartum psychosis

While PPD is a relatively common condition that can be treated through standard psychiatric care, postpartum psychosis is a much rarer and serious condition that could turn into a life-threatening emergency.

Scientists don’t fully understand the causes of PPD, but research suggests it is primarily caused by the rapid drop in estrogen and progesterone following delivery, in addition to physical changes to a mother’s body and sleep deprivation.

Although these hormonal and sleep routine shifts can affect anyone, several risk factors make some women more susceptible to PPD, including a history of depression and anxiety, traumatic pregnancy or birth experience, lack of support, and excessive financial strain.

According to the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development, anxiety and depression in the postpartum period are not the mother’s fault or based on a character flaw.

“Depression and anxiety that happen during pregnancy or any time during the first year after the birth of your baby are medical conditions,” the NICHD website reads. “These fe​elings are not something you caused by doing or not doing something. And, they can be treated if you seek help.” 

Postpartum psychosis, on the other hand, is a rare form of PPD that affects roughly 1 in 1,000 women after delivery, according to the Cleveland Clinic. Symptoms come on quickly and can include severe agitation, confusion, feelings of hopelessness, and delusions. 

About one-third of women who experience postpartum psychosis have previously diagnosed mental health disorders, most commonly bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, or schizophrenia. 

Clancy is not alone in having a diagnosed postpartum psychosis that has led to death.

According to a 2016 meta-analysis of postpartum psychosis-related suicide and filicide, the killing of one’s children, postpartum psychosis increases a woman’s risk of suicide later in life, and as many as 4.5% of depressive psychoses end in the death of a child.

PPP: Excuse for evil or a “total psychotic break”

A growing divide in the discourse is whether compassion for PPD and postpartum psychosis is a bridge too far in cases of abuse, especially with respect to Clancy.

Conservative Christian pundit Allie Beth Stuckey said Tuesday that society can “have grace for people’s struggles without excusing or minimizing the methodical murder of children,” in reference to Clancy’s case. 

“Once we start negating accountability for evil because of mental health diagnoses, we forgo justice all together,” Stuckey said.

Other conservative women, however, think this rhetoric only harms the GOP’s cause in appealing to women.

Kylie Jane Kremer, president of Women for America First, also slammed Walsh for his take on the Clancy case, saying he is “literally embodying the caricature the Left paints of the ‘good ol’ boy Christian nationalist’ Right and proving their point for them.”

“Reducing postpartum depression and serious psychiatric illness to women being ‘selfish’ and hating their children isn’t Christian, compassionate, or medically serious,” Kremer said. “It’s cruel.”

Inez Stepman, senior policy and legal analyst for the Independent Women’s Forum, said on X that postpartum psychosis is entirely different from PPD.

She said postpartum psychosis “has been with us forever under very different cultural circumstances, involves a total psychotic break with reality, and is incredibly scary. 

“The task here of the jury will be to decide if [Clancy] actually experienced that kind of psychotic break with reality,” Stepman said.