Nanny says Lindsay Clancy appeared to be a loving mother before killing her 3 children

Months before Lindsay Clancy strangled her three children, she lost significant weight, couldn't sleep and complained of postpregnancy mental health issues, the family’s former nanny testified at her murder trial Wednesday. But the nanny never worried the Massachusetts mother might be a danger to her children or to herself. “I observed a wonderful mom who loved her kids,” Elaine Rossi told the jury on the seventh day of the trial in Plymouth.

“She was concerned about their safety, and Callan eating and sleeping. She was a wonderful mother.” Clancy’s defense says she was a loving mother who was overmastered by postpartum psychosis, a dangerous psychiatric condition that afflicts a small proportion of women after childbirth and affects their hold on reality. Prosecutors contend that she acted intentionally on Jan.

24, 2023, and should be held criminally responsible for the deaths of Callan, Dawson and Cora Clancy, who ranged in age from 8 months to 5 years. ___ EDITOR’S NOTE: This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S.

is available by calling or texting 988. ___ Rossi was hired in September 2022, a few months after Callan was born, and let go in December after Clancy, 35, decided not to return to work. Rossi said she wasn’t told why Clancy, a former labor and delivery nurse, chose to remain at home.

She testified Wednesday about her time with the Clancy family, describing Cora as a “girly-girl” who loved arts and crafts. Three-year-old Dawson was “full of energy, rambunctious, funny, silly.” Callan was the “sweetest, happiest baby.” The defense sought to portray Clancy as a doting mother who acknowledged her mental health difficulties. Prosecutors likely hope the jury will see a mom who wasn’t impaired by her mental health.

Rossi testified that she saw prescription medicine bottles in the house, and that Clancy “shared with me she had postpartum and couldn’t sleep,” and had taken to sleeping in the basement. In her journals during that time, Clancy indicated she was struggling with anxiety and feeling overwhelmed by motherhood. Both the prosecution and defense read excerpts from her diary to the jury Monday, where she catalogued an ever-shifting lineup of psychiatric prescriptions, as well as thoughts of suicide.