For decades academic and social media has been replete with passionate debate about overnight care of very young children.
Sadly too often concepts of Attachment Theory are poorly understood and frequently confused with notions of capacity to provide care for an infant or confused with the love between a child and a parent.
I doubt anyone would dispute that in general a father is as capable of caring for an infant as a mother. Nor would anyone dispute the importance for the child to share a loving and supportive relationship with both their mother and their father.
But surely this is not the issue when the parents of a very young child or infant separate and arrangements need to be made. We know that children thrive when they have a secure base and their care arrangements are predictable, consistent, stable and responsive to their needs.
I would suggest that the question that we need to ask is what arrangements will BEST meet the CHILD’s developmental needs in this particular family. Issues such as the level of conflict and the parent’s capacity to communicate and agree upon the child’s care arrangements are fundamental to decision making and each family circumstance will be different.
Ilana Katz
Psychologist
