Wounded at birth?
Just wanted to say...
The paramount idea in "The Primal Wound" is that separation from the mother at birth causes the infant to feel a sense of loss equal to an older child's loss of a mother. If this were true, wouldn't all infants in foster homes and nursery wards be crying inconsolably and non-stop, or wouldn't they refuse nourishment, or exhibit SOME sign of extreme sadness? Upon reading "The Primal Wound," I saw that the author offers no proof, no study findings for the idea that abandonment/relinquishment/surrender (whatever you want to call it) causes such anguish in the babies who are abandoned/relinquished/surrendered. She does talk about the fact that babies can distinguish and prefer their own mother to other women. But we know from the relatively new practice of open adoption that this preference is short-lived once a new bond is formed with an adoptive mother. The author fails to show how the initial preference of the baby for the biological mother translates into long-term psychological damage done by separating mother and child at birth. Furthermore, she fails to show that the bonds built between adoptive mothers and their babies are any less strong and supportive than the bonds between biological mothers and the babies they raise.
The Primal Wound as Nancy Verrier describes it has not been proved, but that is not the same as saying that SOME adoptees, me included, don't feel a very real loss by not having been raised by their birth parents. We can see this just by reading these boards.
-lemonchutney
|