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The “good enough” mother begins in pregnancy

The Washington Post, by Vivien K. Burt and Sonya Rasminsky January 3

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Back in the 1950s, pediatrician and psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott coined the term “Good Enough Mother,” making the point that surviving a mother’s small failures gives children the resilience to live in an imperfect world. Winnicott’s focus was on how the child can benefit, rather than suffer, from a mother’s mistakes. But his message applies equally to the mother who suffers because she expects perfection from herself and inevitably falls short. Even the most loving parents get it wrong sometimes; what matters is that we get it right enough of the time. […]

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