ABSTRACT
How do mothers’ own physical and mental health conditions relate to their children’s wellbeing and sleep? Research clearly shows the vital importance for the baby’s future development of parent-infant mutual regulation and responsive synchrony (Feldman, 2007) in the earliest months of life. The lack of this lively mutuality through parental mental health difficulties seems to be key in understanding early psychopathology and particularly sleep disorders. We look here at how parental mental illness can have a negative impact on a whole range of adverse infant outcomes.
