this is in response to "Would birth trauma from forceps
show up two weeks following the birth?"

Birth trauma, similar to any other emotional trauma, can show up at different times in our lives. Trauma caused by birth is recognized by different psychological perspectives. It is believed that birth is seen by infants as an attacking event. In the language of object relations, infants cope with the sense of being attacked by "splitting". They mentally split good objects from bad objects. 

The infant described in this case seems to be age appropriately, "splitting". Let's look at it from his perspective. His head was painfully compressed as he was violently pulled from the warm mother place. In other words, he was attacked. The other part of this new way of being (i.e. far from his mother self) was the warm and non attacking bottle that relieved his sense of being attacked. He splits the giving bottle, known to him as the "good breast" from the withholding. therefore. bad and attacking breast i.e. the maternal breast. Thus, he cries when he meets up with the bad maternal breast. 

It is possible to help an infant see the maternal breast as the giving, good and containing object. In brief, this is done by respecting the infant's immature need to split the good from bad experiences. We therefore, aim to re-create the mother breast as warm and giving.  Practically, help with latching should be very gentle and based on infant cues. Concurrently, emotional support might be provided to the mother in order to help her withstand her infant's negative responses. 

Keren Epstein-Gilboa MEd BScN FACCE LCCE IBCLC 
PhD (Candidate)

             ***********************************************
The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html