ABSTRACT
"Normal is what is there", writes D. W. Winnicott of the baby at the beginning of life. "The baby tends to assume that what is there is normal." Eventually, the baby or child makes comparisons or reads itself through the eyes of others who see deformity. It begins to feel the impact of attitudes towards deformity and feels the gap between inner self and external standards. Winnicott posits a period of feeling normal prior to an awareness of deformity, a "primary normalcy" subject to "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune". Many of Winnicott's most memorable clinical explorations throughout his oeuvre revolve around the problem of depersonalization. A mother dealing with her child's physical deformity brings out with special clarity the fact that in the best of circumstances a mother's feelings towards motherhood and her child are mixed. Personal feeling needs to spread through consciousness as well as body.
