Our work in psychoanalysis, child development, pediatrics, and social work has reflected a continuing interest in the mutuality of theory and clinical work. The present paper arose from our observations

that the theory of the mourning process was essential in order to understand the depressed reactions of certain mothers to the birth of their children. Although this could be observed most clearly and dramatically when a defective child was born, it was apparent to a lesser degree in the birth of children who were not overtly or significantly abnormal. One mother's depressed mourning reaction occurred when a son was born. In later years she said that it took her three months to resign herself to the loss of a daughter and to accept her son.