Case II. ‘Robin’ aet 5 Years

In this case there again presented no psychiatric problem, so that my work consisted in providing a setting in which the child could present himself in terms of his immediate strivings and conflicts. There is no doubt but that although one gets paid for this work there is great pleasure to be derived from meeting in this professional way a child who is well within the meaning of the word normal.

There are other children in this family, all teenagers. In the management of this case it worked out that I saw Robin's mother first and also that I saw her after my interview with him. In the second interview I was able to let her know what had happened between me and Robin. This was a case in which I think the step forward in Robin's development would have taken place spontaneously. It was not absolutely necessary for him to get help from outside the family, as his parents were capable of dealing with the situation themselves. They, however, felt that they wanted help, and it seems likely that the interview I had with Robin facilitated the work which these parents and the whole family were already doing, with the help of the school.

The trouble was that Robin was just beginning to go to school and he was showing signs of school refusal. This was a boy with a rich family life and for him going to school certainly marked an important stage. Incidentally, being the youngest and presumably the last in the family, the problem of Robin's conflict about school was to some extent overlaid by his mother's personal conflict. Here might be the last of her children. When he should go to school she would never recapture the feeling of having a family with all the dependence that this involves. On the other hand, the mother is a woman of immense energy and with specific interests, and the end of this decade of maternal preoccupation could mean for her a release so that she could return to the special skill for which she has been trained. In this particular case these matters would have re