Attachment with children with special needs

Betty Robb

doi:10.9791/ajpanz.1999.07

Betty Robb

DOI: https://doi.org/10.9791/ajpanz.1999.07

Abstract

The paper, initiated by personal experience, looks at the fear of attachment to children with conditions which put them at risk, the experiencing of grief at the loss of the 'fantasy baby' and the acceptance by the parents which enables the attachment to proceed.

Reference is made to attachment issues in the case of adoption, styles of attachment, and some notions of reconstruction in therapy with 'special needs' survivors where attachment has been insecure or the process attenuated by length of risk.

Author Biography

Betty Robb

As recorded in 1999.

Betty Robb is a psychotherapist in Auckland with an abiding interest in attachment issues and child development, which she teaches about in the Foundation of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy course at AFCPC and uses in conjunction with object relations theory when holding groups for mothers and babies at the Centre.