There are many books that deal with pregnancy and maternity; a large number of magazines and articles on pediatric nursing examine these subjects from different points of view. This volume is not a manual and is not intended to explain to future parents what to do and what to avoid. This book looks at the most significant and problematic aspects of this delicate phase of a woman s life and that of a couple. It seeks to offer a key to understand the deep significance and complexity of the path to follow to become parents and to face fears linked to the difficulty of procreation, using the tools of observation and psychoanalytic listening. Reviewing several experiences of clinical work, the authors offer reflections on the personal experiences of women and couples and the difficulties which can be met when the desire for a child is disappointed. A maternity and parenting project can be frustrated by miscarriages and encounter the fear of infertility. How are the problems of sterility or spontaneous abortion experienced? What are the consequences on a psychological and emotional level for parents and within the relationship with the child who is born after these painful experiences? The authors deepen some problematic issues, describing ways of intervening with the important preventive aim of avoiding that the suffering of the parents compromises the emotional development of the child. The central idea of this work is that it is possible to get over a difficult beginning or relationship and that unresolved problems can be renegotiated at every stage of development. It is possible to recover from a moment of misunderstanding and disharmony within a couple and promote the development of the relationship between mother and child. The authors have tried to show how the bond between them is formed in the absolute uniqueness of every relationship, facing the inevitable human limits which ensure that nothing is perfect. This study is intended above all for parents, but naturally also for psychologists, doctors, gynecologists, obstetricians and pediatricians, who can consider the complexity of these experiences from a new point of view."

This book describes an approach to children and young people who might be helped by child psychotherapy. Attention is paid to factors within the child's personality, to strengths and impediments in the developmental process, and to the family and wider school and community context. Individual chapters address both clinical methods and a variety of clinical problems, including work with very young children and their parents, severe deprivation and family breakdown, developmental delay, and the more serious psychological illnesses of childhood. Assessment in Child Psychotherapy is a significant contribution to all mental health professionals who need to be able to identify the precise nature of a child, adolescent or family's problems and to offer the most appropriate help. Such a book is long overdue. It spans a range of thinking about how best to reach those whose emotional and behavioural difficulties pose challenging questions as to the most suitable forms of treatment.

This book describes an approach to children and young people who might be helped by child psychotherapy. Attention is paid to factors within the child's personality, to strengths and impediments in the developmental process, and to the family and wider school and community context. Individual chapters address both clinical methods and a variety of clinical problems, including work with very young children and their parents, severe deprivation and family breakdown, developmental delay, and the more serious psychological illnesses of childhood. Assessment in Child Psychotherapy is a significant contribution to all mental health professionals who need to be able to identify the precise nature of a child, adolescent or family's problems and to offer the most appropriate help. Such a book is long overdue. It spans a range of thinking about how best to reach those whose emotional and behavioural difficulties pose challenging questions as to the most suitable forms of treatment.

There are many books that deal with pregnancy and maternity, and a large number of magazines and articles on paediatric nursing that examine these subjects from different points of view. This volume is not a manual and is not intended to explain to future parents what to do and what to avoid. The objective is rather to look at the most significant and problematic aspects of this delicate phase of a woman's life and that of a couple. It seeks to offer a key to understand the deep significance and complexity of the path to follow to become parents and to face fears linked to the difficulty of procreation, using the tools of observation and psychoanalytic listening. Reviewing several experiences of clinical work, the authors offer reflections on the personal experiences of women and couples and the difficulties which can be met when the desire for a child is disappointed. A maternity and parenting project can be frustrated by miscarriages and encounter the fear of infertility. How are the problems of sterility or spontaneous abortion experienced?