Baby, Don't Go!

Is the time away from your baby making you miserable?

- Sheetal Choudhary

Separation anxiety in children is a term routinely bandied around by new mothers; whose children have been put in playschool or preschool. This term is used loosely, to describe tantrums and crying fits thrown about by children when their parents leave them at the playschool premises, though psychologists would not quite agree with its loose usage. An area less explored is that of anxiety suffered by new mothers who have to leave their child, be it for an errand or to go back to resuming their careers.

‘Maternal Instinct’ is a term which has found detractors, as not having any biological origin. It is attributed by the naysayers to the conditioning that a woman is subjected to. The jury is out on it. But women have reported feeling anxiety at clinical levels, for having to leave their child.