ABSTRACT
This discusses possible reasons for the mother's disavowal and failure to act, as well as the predicament of the older child and his own distress at being unable to intervene. It focuses on two long examples from a yearlong observation. The chapter explains the mother's failure to intervene when the seventeen-month-old toddler behaved in a disturbing way towards her sister, permitting behaviour that was abusive. It considers how Mother's own problems possibly left her vulnerable in the face of Kim's jealousy towards her new sister and in such a way that her own potential for mothering Lucy was seriously impaired. Both children were unprotected—the baby from her sister's assaults and the older child from anxiety about her sadistic attacks, raising questions whether the mother felt guilty about betraying her older child or identified with the aggressor rather than the victim.
