AFTER THE POSTNATAL EXAMINATION – CONCLUSION

Many of us have difficulty in accepting our own parents as sexually active people and some women may have difficulty accepting their own sexuality now that they too are mothers. There is another group of women for whom the experience of having their own baby brings an ‘echo of the past’ (Tobert, 1987).That is, they are reminded of themselves as babies or of other babies in their life. The episode may be very varied and is specific for each individual woman. Sometimes the memory may be of past sexual abuse and disclosure to a sensitive person around the time of the birth of their own baby is not uncommon. Sometimes the memory is of the death or illness of a sibling.

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