I read an article in the Daily Mail yesterday about a woman who is concerned because she could not bring herself to love her first daughter.
The link has mysteriously disappeared, but you can find a synopsis here.
Basically, this woman, Shelley Price, has two little girls, each by a different father. No matter how hard she tries, she just cannot love her eldest, even though she feels an intense love for her youngest. This is a LONG article, with full names and pictures and descriptions of how much this mother loves one daughter and not the other. Perhaps she is having trouble because the eldest is a product of an unsuccessful relationship. Who knows. I’m no shrink.
But I do know a couple of things.
1) I have heard of many women who have a hard time loving their children the way that they think they are supposed to. Men have this problem too but I suppose they get away with it easier. I never had this problem, but I guess I can see how it happens. Parenthood is glorified in our society. People who choose not to have children are often teased and ostracized. So it feels like a requirement. People who don’t like children are told that they will once they are “their own” and this isn’t always true.
but..
2) This problem, however widespread it may be, does NOT give this woman the right to publicly humiliate her daughter! Now everyone at school will know that mommy doesn’t love her. The article used full names and even had pictures! How insensitive is that?!? Her behavior seems to show a callous disregard for human emotion…which, with my B.A. in Psychology, leads me to believe that she could be a sociopath.
Thoughts? Is this woman out of line? Have you ever experienced what she says she has experienced? What about postpartum depression? Sufferers, can the effects last a very long time?
