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When I first became involved in the work of the Centre's service for parents and infants the majority of our clients were seeking advice and help with the day-to-day difficulties of child-rearing. As well as providing medical supervision, our views were sought, for example, on weaning, toilet training and eating habits; and in offering guidance we took into account both the parents’ personalities and the infant's stage of development. This aspect of our work continues but we are finding increasingly that the problems parents bring to us reflect the problems of society in general and parallel to some extent the issues dealt with in other departments at the Centre. We are consulted ever more frequently by parents concerned for the welfare of their children following the breakdown of their marriage.1
Mrs B sought an appointment on the recommendation of a friend. A tense young woman, she explained that she could not get Danny to settle to sleep in the evenings. Danny, aged 23 months, needed to fall asleep in his mothers's arms, and after two or three hours in his own bed, he wakened and could not settle again until he was in his mother's bed, where he spent the rest of the night, waking frequently and demanding reassurance from ‘mummy … my mummy’.
With little prompting the story came pouring out. The marriage had been a failure from the beginning: Mr B's business existed in his imagination rather than in reality; he was deeply in debt and was apparently unrealistic about his prospects. Bitterly Mrs B told us that she had even had to pay for their honeymoon. She became pregnant shortly after the wedding; there were increasing arguments and recriminations and Mr B spent more and more time away from home. After two years, they split up and a divorce followed. The court gave custody to the mother with ‘reasonable access’ awarded to the father. Mr B moved in with his girlfriend.
Mrs B was angry and resentful. She did not want Danny to go out with father if this meant meeting hi