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To understand why a mother, who appears to be competent and responsible, is unable to respond appropriately to her newborn infant creates a problem for those seeking to guide her and poses intriguing questions for the psychoanalytic observer.
Among the possible factors that could contribute to such a situation will be the significance of this particular child to the mother. Was the child planned and wanted? Is the sex of the infant a cause for disappointment? Is the child a replacement for a lost baby or an aborted pregnancy, and so on? One may, in the course of getting to know the adult, gain clues that point to traumas in the mother's early life that are reactivated by the birth of this child. Disappointment and difficulties with the child's father or resentment over an interrupted career will also need to be considered, as well as the history of the pregnancy and the mother's experiences at the time of her confinement.
In the Well-Baby Clinic, we are currently following the development of an infant whose mother was unable to appreciate the baby's poor state for a number of weeks following the birth. Mrs K, who was not suffering from a recognizable depressive reaction, seemed unable to follow suggestions that were given with the aim of improving the baby's physical well-being. We were so concerned over the child's state that we saw the mother and baby each week for some time.
In view of our later knowledge, it is probably significant that the mother, who was familiar with the work of the Clinic, did not follow up the suggestion that she bring Jenny, her second child, to the Well-Baby Clinic until, when Jenny was 6 weeks old, a health-care worker commented on the child's poor weight gain.
Mrs K had first contacted a member of the Clinic staff for advice and guidance over Emily, her first child, when the child was 12 months old. Emily has a profound, congenital deafness, thought to be of genetic origin. Her condition had not been diagnosed until she was 8 months old, fo