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Hyper mothers: intensive mothering in question
Intensive mothering for some, proximal mothering for others … Co-sleeping, prolonged breastfeeding, carrying in a sling, do not seem to constitute an epiphenomenon. Is this conception of motherhood really fulfilling for the child? How did we go from the model of the active woman to the resurgence of triumphant motherhood? Sensitive subject to believe the experts and the numerous testimonies of the mothers practicing it …
Intensive mothering, a rather vague definition
These “natural” mothers are mothers who have chosen to live their pregnancy, the birth of their baby and their way of educating it with a single watchword: to be totally devoted to their child and its needs. Their conviction: the bond that is woven with the baby during the first months is an indestructible emotional base. They believe in providing their child with real internal security, and this is the key to his future balance. This so-called exclusive or intensive mothering promotes certain practices that promote the unique “mother-child” bond. We find there pell-mell: prenatal singing, natural birth, home delivery, late breastfeeding, natural weaning, babywearing, co-sleeping, skin-to-skin, washable diapers, a organic food, natural hygiene, soft and alternative medicine, education without violence, and alternative educational pedagogies such as Freinet, Steiner or Montessori, even family education.
A mother testifies on the forums: “As a mother of twins, I breastfed them happily, in the so-called“ wolf ”position, lying on my side in bed. It was really great. I did the same for my 3rd child. My husband supports me in this process. I also tested the baby wrap, it’s great and it soothes babies. “
From childcare “the hard way” to “hypermaternantes”
The practice of proximal mothering has emerged across the Atlantic. One of the leading figures is the American pediatrician William Sears, author of the expression “attachment parenting”. This concept is based on the theory of attachment developed by John Bowlby, an English psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, who died in 1990. For him, attachment is one of the primary needs of a young child, such as eating or sleeping. It is only when his needs for closeness are met that he can move away from the parental figure that secures him to explore the world. For fifteen years we have seen a shift : from a model advocating letting an infant cry, not taking him in his bed, we have gradually moved to the opposite trend. Babywearing, late breastfeeding or co-sleeping have more and more followers.
A mother testifies to her application to respond to the typical portrait of the mothering mother: “swaddling, yes I did, breastfeeding too, sleeping in a sleeping bag yes and, moreover, both daddy and me, the scarf no I preferred to have it in my arms or in my coat. For sign language it is special, Naïss is in two clubs a “sign with your hands” and a second “little hands”, and yet I am neither deaf nor mute. “
Meeting the needs of babies
The specialist Claude Didier Jean Jouveau, ex-president of the Leche League and author of several books on breastfeeding, has for years understood and supported these so-called “hyper maternal” mothers. She explains: “These mothers are simply responding to the infant’s need to be carried and fed on demand. I don’t understand this taboo in France while in other countries it all seems normal ”. She continues: “When the human baby is born, we know that its physical development is not complete. Anthropologists call it the “ex-utero fetus”. It is as if the human baby was born prematurely even though it actually came to an end in the number of weeks of amenorrhea. In comparison with the offspring of animals, the human baby will need two years during which he will acquire autonomy, while a foal for example becomes autonomous fairly quickly after birth ”.
Take your baby against you, breastfeed him, wear it often, keep it close to you at night… for her, this proximal mothering is necessary and even essential. The specialist does not understand the reluctance of some experts. , “The first year there needs to be continuity after pregnancy, the infant must feel that his mother helps him to develop”.
The risks of hypermaternage
Sylvain Missonnier, psychoanalyst and professor of clinical psychopathology of perinatal care at the University of Paris-V-René-Descartes, is much more reserved in the face of this intensive mothering. In his book “Becoming a parent, born human. The virtual diagonal ”published in 2009, he exposes another point of view: for him, the baby has to live a series ofseparation trials as birth, weaning, toilet training, which are essential steps to prepare the child to take his autonomy. This author takes the example of “skin to skin” practiced too long, considered as a brake on a fundamental learning of babies, that of separation. For him, the educational process cannot exist without putting these separations to the test. Some practices also present a physical risk. Co-sleeping for example, which increases the risk of sudden death when the baby is lying in the parental bed. The French Pediatric Society recalls on this subject the good practices of sleeping infants: on the back, in a sleeping bag and in a bed as empty as possible on a hard mattress. Experts are also concerned about the few cases of sudden death that have occurred while the child was carried in a sling.
Some mothers testify with ardor against these practices on the forums and not only for the potentially fatal risk of co-sleeping: “I have not practiced this kind of method and even less the“ co-sleeping ”. To make the child sleep in the same bed as the parents is to give children bad habits. Everyone has their own bed, my daughter has hers and we have ours. I think it’s better to keep couple’s intimacy. I find the word mothering for my part weird, because this word totally excludes the daddy and it is one of the reasons why I did not breastfeed anyway. “
The status of women in hypermaternage
This subject necessarily raises questions about the consequences of these practices, which are very implicating for mothers, on the more general status of women. Who are the mothers seduced by the intensive mothering ? Some of them are rather graduates and have often left the working world following a maternity leave. They explain how difficult it is for them to reconcile their family life with professional constraints and a very demanding vision of motherhood with other activities. Is this a step backwards as claimed by Elisabeth Badinter in her book “The conflict: the woman and the mother” published in 2010? The philosopher castigates a reactionary speech which confines women to their role as mothers, with for example what she considers a diktat concerning breastfeeding. The philosopher thus denounces a maternal model loaded with too many expectations, constraints, and obligations for women.
We can indeed ask ourselves to what extent these “hyper” mothers do not seek to escape a world of work perceived as stressful and not very rewarding, and which does not take their status as mothers into account sufficiently. A hyper motherhood experienced in a way as a refuge in a world in crisis and full of uncertainties.