our thinking | your concerns | our response | our rationale
Our Thinking
Our approach is psychodynamic. In other words, we place an emphasis on relationships. The psychodynamic approach is based on the way babies integrate and understand their experiences -- everything stems from their relationships with significant others. Such integration is driven by their internal tendencies and motivations. But integrating experiences is also dependant upon the capacity of the parents to recognise and respond to their baby's needs. We observe and think about:
- the quality of external relationships
- the quality of internal relationships
- integrating needs and satisfaction
- integrating the full range of experiences and feelings
- emotional attunement
We are informed by developmental psychology. The family with an infant in distress is considered both as a whole unit and as a group of individuals. We look closely at infants' development -- physical and emotional -- and at their capacity to integrate experiences, to adapt to the world and to defend or soothe themselves and why. We observe infants in relation to each of their family members and explore the dynamics of those relationships. We also work with parents as individuals and as a couple and we observe siblings individually and in the various family dynamics as well.
We use psychoanalytic tools. Psychoanalysis gives us the ability to understand emotions and family dynamics from every perspective in a non-judgemental manner.
We work in a creative way. We are able to use a variety of therapies and a combination of treatment approaches to explore and meet the needs of each family member. Our method of therapy has been distilled from 35 years of actual clinical work, studying and observing what methods work best, when and how they work, using input from infant research, neuropsychology, psychoanalysis, recent theories of the mind and attachment theory and practice.
We intervene early. Because we can work effectively with babies just 2-months old, we always recommend to parents to get a consultation as soon as they have concerns. An early intervention could save parents, their child and their family years of unnecessary misery.
Three different types of consulting rooms at the Parent Infant Clinic: private one-on-one work (left), couples work (center) and family/siblings (right). All rooms at the Clinic are maintained in a “residential” style.
Your Concerns
Deep down, parents know. They know when their child is not developing as expected. There may be very clear signs (poor sleep, refusal to eat, or overt clinginess, for example) or more subtle ones (concerns, worries or distress) about attunement -- a parent's ability to identify and respond to their child's emotional needs. Usually, emotional problems are problems of attunement. Being attuned is a dance, a process of trial and error, when parents learn their infant's likes and dislikes, what soothes their child and how best to comfort them. Attunement is the basis of secure attachment. Some infants, however, can be more difficult to attune to and in such cases we can offer consultation, observe the minutia of the attunement dance and then assist the parents and child in forming a more attuned way of being with one another.
Our Response
We are early interventionists. We listen to parents' worries fully aware that responding as soon as possible to clearly identified concerns will facilitate optimum development for that infant. While we work with infants from birth, early intervention can even be made before birth. We can offer consultation to expectant parents who may be experiencing feelings such as extreme anxiety or dread. Parents who have given birth to a child with special needs may face specific worries before the birth of another child and may wish to explore these prior to unconsciously transmitting their hopes or fears on to their child.
Our Rationale
We intervene early as the brain is wiring up. The idea behind early intervention is simple and powerful: most of brain development occurs in the first 3 years, particularly the first 2 years of life. The number of cells (neurons) in the brain at birth about 100 billion remains the same throughout our lives. In the first year of life, each neuron forms about 15,000 synapses (connections). By the end of the second year, the brain will have formed 1,000 trillion connections. It is all these connections that make the brain of a 2-year old so much heavier than the newborn four times as much. Since two-thirds of brain development occurs within the first two years, the earlier we can find and maintain attunement, the less damage there will be to the child-parent attachment, their communication and the developing neurological system.
Research confirms our intuitions. When we first began our work with infants and parents three decades ago, we were working from clinical intuition. Today, neurobiological research seems to be validating our early findings that healthy bonds and healthy brains depend on quality relationships with the primary caregivers (usually parents) and on the consequent connections of neurons in the brain.
Use it or lose it. There is much evidence for the use it or lose it theory of brain development. Between the ages of 2 and 3 years, some serious pruning must begin in order for the brain to be wired up efficiently. Each neuron may prune up to 10,000 of these connections if they are not needed or have not been used. Early events determine which circuits in the brain will be reinforced and retained. New synapses can in fact be formed at any time during life, whenever completely new situations demand it, but never with the same ease as in the early years.
Scans of the brain at birth, 3 months and 2 years reveal increasing density and complexity of connections among the neurons