STUDIES IN ULCERATIVE COLITIS
In keeping with observations reported in previous studies, the mothers of the ulcerative colitis patients had experienced a lack of warmth and maternal care. Their mothers consistently were characterized as cold, severe, domineering. They all felt they had failed to win love and affection despite se...
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Veröffentlicht in: | The American journal of psychiatry 1958-06, Vol.114 (12), p.1067-1076 |
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Sprache: | eng |
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Zusammenfassung: | In keeping with observations reported in previous studies, the mothers of the ulcerative colitis patients had experienced a lack of warmth and maternal care. Their mothers consistently were characterized as cold, severe, domineering. They all felt they had failed to win love and affection despite serious effort to do so. While hostility toward their disappointing mothers is apparent, their dependency and great sense of insecurity, masked by compensatory patterns of independence and self-sufficiency, is more marked.
Toward their children, patterns that superficially seem not unlike those of their own mothers are evident, in that they too seem to be domineering and controlling mothers. Where it has been possible to observe this pattern more closely (Mrs. D., Mrs. F. and Mrs. A.) it has been seen that this effort at control is motivated by deep fear that failure will have disastrous consequences. The potential disaster stems in part probably from their own destructive wishes toward the child, e.g., Mrs. F.'s death wishes toward and fear of the patient's death. The effort at control proves to be unsuccessful and the mother suffers the narcissistic pain, anxiety and discouragement of a sense of failure in her actual inability to meet the child's needs as her mother had failed to meet her needs. Anxiety stems from the feeling of lack of support and acceptance by their mothers initially and by the later reality of lack of supporting figures, chiefly the husband. Mrs. E., who had previously cared for 5 children, was finally overwhelmed by the brutality of the alcoholic father who physically threatened her life. She unsuccessfully attempted to withdraw from the situation entirely.
The mothers then, are anxious and fearful persons who desperately and unsuccessfully attempt to control in a situation in which they feel adequate support is not exercised by dependable parental figures. Their anxiety is augmented by their sense of inadequacy to meet demands made upon them and by the actual failure to provide for their own dependent needs and those of the child. The illness of the child eventually serves for them as a confirmation of their own inadequacy and of the undependability of the environment.
The role of the father as a factor in the determination of the illness is more variable than that of the mother. His ability or inability to emotionally support the mother in her maternal role is a basic consideration. Some of the fathers failed in this respect, but were ill, |
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ISSN: | 0002-953X 1535-7228 |
DOI: | 10.1176/ajp.114.12.1067 |