Basic HTML Version
Unmasking a Conspiracy
Against the Newborn
Who would have guessed that from the moment ofbirth infants are often deprived of their right to
emotional maturity. Here is how
it
happens- and what must be done about
it.
F
ROM THE
very beginning of life
most infants in the Western
world face a virtual conspiracy
against emotional maturity.
T he newborn infant usually is tak–
en from its anesthetized mother,
washed and weighed. After a few
brief minutes with mother, the infant
is placed in a crib in the nursery,
where it spends most of the first few
days of life- alone.
Yet it is in these first critica!
minutes and hours oflife that we form
our initial emotional attachment to
another human being. The crucial
importance of clase contact between
the mother and her child right afler
birth has been prevented or denied for
more than a generation.
Doctors, nurses and psychologists
are only now becoming aware of this
tragedy.
What Real-Lite Experlences
Reveal
When mothers in hospitals (whatever
happened to the home births?) are
allowed direct skin-to-skin contacl
with their newborn children, they
respond to this early, inlimate con–
tact with their babies differently
from mothers denied such needed
contact. A remarkable sludy re–
porled, "they held their babies face
lo face, talked to, fondled , kissed,
caressed, and smiled at them more
than the other mothers."
Not surprisingly, " babies of early–
conlact mothers gained more weight,
cried less, and smiled and laughed
more than the olher infants."
It
was
also found that premalure babies,
who are separaled from their moth–
ers for long periods after birlh, are
more likely to be abused lhan full-
March 1980
by
Craig Jackson
term babies
(Psychology Today ,
"The Firsl Day of Life," December,
1977).
In our "enl ightened" modern so–
ciety where only
20
percent of moth–
ers experience natural childbirth,
babies generally are taken from their
mothers just at the time when they
most desperately need to be logether.
Both mother and child suffer from
this early hindrance lo emotional
bonding lhrough touching.
And yel, lhis early separation of
molher and child is only the begin–
ning of a pattern thal carries on into
later life.
In many families, parents allow
their children to mature without
those all-important physical expres–
sions of life-lhe warm hugs and
caresses that show them they are
appreciated and cared for. There are
families in which embracing is habit–
ually withheld except in cases of
prolonged absence or family tragedy.
There exist fami lies whose chi ldren
have rarely if ever seen their parents
embrace each other or show physical
affection.
Children of such families grow up
feeling insecure, inhibited, afraid of
being hurt, and therefore afraid of
seeking intimacy wilh others. They
may have a hard time in their dating
and marriage relalionships. They
may feel cold and emotionally flat,
wilhout knowing why. Later, as par–
ents, they will have hangups aboul
expressing !ove to lheir own off–
spring.
This is not to say that there is no
!ove in such nontouching families–
the !ove is lhere, usually, bul it seems
somehow stunted, repressed or hid–
den. (However, hidden !ove is nol
much better than no love at all.)
Humans who a r e deprived in
infancy and childhood suffer drasti–
cally from it. From surveys of pris–
oners and of 49 d ifferent primitive
cultures it has been concluded that
deprivation of physical affection "is
the principal overriding factor ... in
the development of alienation, psy–
chopathy, violence and aggression,
and ... drug abuse and alcoholism
(Behavior Today,
May
15,
1978).
The study is frightening: by de–
priving infants and children of physi–
cal love, parents may, in a sense,
produce warped adults who are
unable to relate to others-or who
are even predisposed lo violent or
criminal behavior!
Lack of love and affection in the
earliest years have long range nega–
tive effects. Perhaps you yourself
come from a family background that
was cold, unemotional, and lacking
in displays of physical affection. Per–
haps you were ignored or even
abused as a young child. As a result,
you may fi nd in yourself certain fears
or inhibitions that you have found it
difficult to overcome.
So, remember, mothers- and fa–
thers- by cuddling, embracing and
loving your baby or toddler, you are
giving him or her the foundation that
you may have lacked-the knowl–
edge that he or she is loved, accepted,
secure. You can give your childrén
inner resources that will make them
more confident, more properly asser–
tive, more affectionate and outgoing
as adults.
Don't be afraid to add the human
touch to the life of an infant-and
see the joy that flows from one simple
act. o
25