Cession, as described for the first time by the authors of this paper, is a specific family situation in which there is both a rejection of maternity and a delegation of maternity to another person, usually the mother or an infertile sister of the real mother. The ceded child feels his adoptive mother to be his 'real' mother. Cessions may be benign or malignant, according to whether guilt is reparatory or persecutory.

We have presented the case of a child in the course of analysis who was ceded upon birth and whom we feel is a good illustration of the most outstanding points of cession.