Mom and sister testify about Lindsay Clancy's declining mental state before she killed her children

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.

PLYMOUTH, Mass. (AP) — Coverage of the Lindsay Clancy trial">Lindsay Clancy 's mother and sister took the stand Monday to recount how they saw her become increasingly anxious, paranoid and suicidal in the months before she killed her three children.

Clancy's mother, Paula Musgrove, sounding at times emotional, described her daughter as a dedicated and loving mother whose mental health began declining in October 2022 — about three months before Clancy strangled the children and attempted to kill herself. Musgrove recalled getting a desperate text from Clancy around that time.

"Mom, will you please come up and stay with me for a bit? I'm really sick. Something is wrong," Clancy wrote in the message displayed to the jury. "I had horrible insomnia all night, and I just don't know how I am going to get through the day. I started taking the medicine the doctor prescribed for anxiety, and I think it's made things worse. It's just really scary, and I don't want to be alone."

Musgrove also recalled a more alarming disclosure in December, when she was standing in the kitchen with Clancy and her then-husband, Patrick Clancy. Musgrove said her daughter appeared nervous and told them she needed to tell them something.

"She told us she had thoughts of harming the children," Musgrove said.

WATCH: What is postpartum psychosis? The condition at the center of Lindsay Clancy's murder trial

Musgrove, who lived in Connecticut, often stayed with her daughter in Massachusetts from October into December 2022. She said Clancy was scared of sleeping alone, became increasingly paranoid and believed the medications she was taking "were destroying her mind."

The testimony from Clancy's mother and sister came in the fourth week of her murder trial , soon after the prosecution rested after calling several dozen witnesses.

Prosecutors argue that Clancy, a former labor and delivery nurse, planned the Jan. 24, 2023, killings and contrived to get her husband out of the house by sending him to get takeout and to the pharmacy.

Clancy's attorney Kevin Reddington does not dispute that she killed the children. But he says the jury should not hold her criminally responsible because she had postpartum psychosis, a rare mental illness linked to the stress, sleep deprivation and hormonal changes that follow childbirth. He said she also had bipolar disorder and that antidepressants prescribed after the birth of her third child worsened her condition .

The jury has heard so far from witnesses who demonstrated that Clancy had sought treatment for severe mental health problems, including admitting herself to a psychiatric hospital.