Freud_Burlingham_1943_War_and_Children_k_text

But even with the best intentions these conditionscannot be always kept up. We wentthrough a difficult time when the country housewas in quarantine for scarlet fever and had tobe closed to visitors for three months. Motherswho, under ordinary visiting conditions, feltvery placid about their children's stay with us,would suddenly call up by telephone in anexcited manner, complain that they had not receivedan answer to some imaginary letter oftheirs which had never reached us, that they"worried day and night" about their child, thatthey "did not even hear whether the child wasalive or dead", etc.Several mothers took theirchildren home on visits after the lifting of thequarantine to make up for lost contact. Butthese visits did not prove too satisfactory. Somemothers complained that the children did notseem the same to them, one of our stoutest girlswas considered too thin by the mother.Little Sandra, three years old, refused to lookat her father whenever he tried to approachher, whereupon he telephoned us in an excitedmanner and declared: "I do not like the goingsonin that country house".But fortunately Sandra cried at the parents'next visit when the moment of parting arrived.That, completely helped the situation andrestored her father's confidence in us.A great many of these reactions of166the par-