Netflix's "Maternal Instinct": A Therapist's Take, a Trigger Warning, and Permission to Skip It

By now you've probably seen it everywhere: Netflix's new true crime documentary Maternal Instinct premiered on June 12 and quickly became one of the most talked-about releases of the summer. The film follows the real case of Taylor Parker, a Texas woman who maintained a faked pregnancy for months and ultimately killed a pregnant woman, Reagan Simmons Hancock, in order to take her unborn baby.

It's the kind of story that's almost impossible to look away from. It's also, for a lot of women, the kind of story that can land somewhere tender.

As a therapist who works primarily with women navigating pregnancy, infertility, postpartum, and birth trauma, I didn't want to write a review. I wanted to write a heads-up, and share a bit of a hot take on what I think gets lost in conversations like this one.

A Quick Content Note

If you're pregnant, trying to conceive, pregnant or newly postpartum, navigating infertility, or healing from a traumatic birth or loss, here's what to know going in. This documentary includes:

• A faked pregnancy, sustained over months, with details about how it was maintained

• Violence against a pregnant woman

• The death of a pregnant woman and her unborn baby

• Themes of pregnancy loss, infant loss, and abduction

• Real, raw interviews with grieving family members

  
  

This isn't "scary movie" hard, it's a real story about a real family, and it touches some of the most vulnerable parts of the reproductive experience like trust in your body, trust in the people around you, and the fear that something could go wrong.

Why We're Drawn to Stories Like This (and Why That's Okay)

True crime is one of the most popular genres for a reason. There's something about watching a story like this unfold; piecing together the "why," sitting with fear from the safety of your own couch, and usually arriving at some kind of resolution by the end can feel almost regulating. It scratches an itch for understanding, for justice, for making sense of something that otherwise feels senseless.

If you've watched it and felt that pull, that's not a character flaw, you've just confirmed you're human.

The Story Underneath the Story

Here's my hot take.

Stories like Maternal Instinct tend to get framed around the twist — the lie, the reveal, the "how did no one see this coming?" But from where I sit clinically, what I see underneath is something quieter: a long, slow story about mental health struggles that went unnamed, unsupported, and untreated for years, until they compounded into something irreversible.

That is not an excuse. Nothing excuses what happened to Reagan Simmons Hancock and her baby.

It is a reminder of how high the stakes are when mental health goes unaddressed — especially for women, and especially around pregnancy.

Consider what we already know about maternal mental health in this country:

• An estimated 75% of women with a maternal mental health condition never receive treatment for it, according to the Maternal Mental Health Leadership Alliance

• More than 80% of maternal mental health concerns go unreported or unrecognized altogether

• 84% of women of childbearing age live in areas with a shortage of maternal mental health providers, per the Policy Center for Maternal Mental Health

• Untreated maternal mental health conditions — including suicide and overdose — are now the leading cause of pregnancy-related death in the U.S., according to the CDC

These numbers don't explain or justify a crime. But they do point to a much bigger, much quieter crisis: women whose internal struggles go unseen until something breaks. Not because no one cared, but because our systems aren't built to catch it — and because pregnancy is a season where everyone is watching the belly, and almost no one is asking, "how are you, really?"

Holding Space for Reagan

In true crime, it's easy for the victim to become a supporting character in someone else's story. I don't want that to happen here.

Reagan Simmons Hancock was 21 years old and expecting her first baby. She had a family who loved her — and who is still grieving her, not as a plot point, but as a person. If you watch this documentary, I'd gently invite you to let her story stay at the center of it, even as the film understandably spends much of its runtime inside Taylor Parker's psychology.

If You're in a Vulnerable Season, You Don't Have to Watch This

Here's your permission slip: if you're pregnant, trying to conceive, or healing from birth trauma or loss, and this documentary doesn't feel like something you need right now — skip it. That's not avoidance. That's wisdom.

And if you've already watched it and something got stirred up — grief, fear, hypervigilance about your own pregnancy, intrusive thoughts — that's a completely normal response to genuinely hard content. It doesn't mean something is wrong with you.

You Don't Have to Carry This Alone

If this post brought something up for you — whether it's connected to this documentary or to something it touched on underneath — that's worth talking through with someone. At Nurturing Wellness, I work with women navigating pregnancy, infertility, postpartum, birth trauma, and the parts of motherhood that often go unspoken. If you're looking for support, reach out here to schedule a consultation.

If you're having thoughts of harming yourself, please reach out for support right away: call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, or contact Postpartum Support International's HelpLine at 1-800-944-4773. You don't have to go through this alone.