ABSTRACT
This chapter relates to a traumatic birth that disrupted the attachment relationship between mother and child. The film documentary The Story of the Weeping Camel records the use of the Mongolian hoos ritual to heal the relations between a mother camel and her newborn calf, which the mother has rejected. Attachment is a major research theme in psychology and psychiatry. It was Francoise Dolto who placed the young child on the agenda in France with her proposal that a child should be seen from conception as an autonomous, knowing and linguistically competent being. Even the youngest children know what is going on in their life and in their surroundings, in spite of their lack of a language in which to express it and in spite of their undeveloped cognitive faculties. The traumatic birth continues to form an obstacle dividing mother and child, which may indeed persist indefinitely.
