Editorial

This first edition of the Journal in 2015 contains some thought-provoking and innovative ideas about working with some very challenging children and their families.

Björn Salomonsson’s paper raises some interesting technical questions about psychoanalytically informed parent–toddler therapy. The author defines his clinical approach with a detailed account of his work with a two-and-a-half-year-old boy and his depressed mother. With animated detail, he subtly traces the moment-to-moment movement within sessions as different states of mind, in both child and parent, are played out. The paper goes on to consider some key approaches to parent–toddler work, highlighting similarities and differences between models. Does Salomonsson’s approach, as the title suggests, constitute an ‘extension of the field’ of parent–toddler therapy? Is it a difference of degree or kind? Whatever the answer, Salomonsson’s overarching emphasis on ‘a dialogue with parent and child and on interpretations relating to the unconscious motivations of each of them’ allows for valuable reflection on the complex dynamics involved in parent–toddler work and will contribute to the evolving debate on technique.

Pozzi, Micotti and Rashid’s paper explores the phenomenon, little studied in psychoanalytic literature, of children with selective mutism. The paper offers a literature review followed by two case histories of children who would not speak outside of the home. The writers look at the complexity of intergenerational dysfunctional dynamics within the family, specifically around issues of trauma and loss in different forms, which it is believed contributed to the symptoms of selective mutism in the children. A variety of multi-disciplinary interventions is described: individual psychotherapy, parent–child psychotherapy and family therapy. What emerges is a picture of ‘silent’ parents and families following some unspoken emotional trauma. The clinicians helped the families to give voice to unthinkable ev