Posted by Dinah on January 2, 2008, at 23:18:39
In reply to Maternal depression/ NY Times magazine/12/30/07, posted by stargazer2 on January 2, 2008, at 10:03:09
She never met my son. :)
He's exquisitely attuned to even minor changes in mood. And he tries so hard to fix things.
I'm sure both my genetic endowments and being around me contributed to that, and I'm sorry for the pain it will cause him. But I'm also so impressed by the value of his empathy, the positive aspects of it, that it helped me accept the same qualities in myself.
I think it was my therapist who pointed out that children with depressed mothers often go into the helping professions. It's not *all* negative.
And I'm not sure you can blame the mother's behavior for all of it. Surely there's a biological link as well? And of course there is the child. Any relationship has two parts, and kids aren't really clay ready to be molded. A child brings his own responses to the dyad, molding both mother and the relationship, just as the mother molds the child and the relationship.
poster:Dinah
thread:803771
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20080101/msgs/803944.html