00978

Consider how difficult it is for a two-year-old boy to understand what is going on when mother shifts periodically and totally from one kind of a person to another kind of a person.  A number of reasons can account for this kind of change.  One is alcoholism.  Mother is “high.”  She cuddles and strokes him and tickles him until he screams.  She plays tag with him around the table.  She throws him in the air.  She claps her hands and laughs hysterically as he swings the cat by the tail.  Whee!  Life is glorious!  Then mother passes out.  For hours the little boy is abandoned.  He is hungry.  He is empty.  She is gone.  The stroking is gone.  How can he get it back?  What happened?  What did he do?  He doesn’t know.  Later she wakes up sick.  She can’t stand the sight of him.  She pushes him away.  He cries and comes to her again.  She hits him.  What happened?  It had felt so good.  Now it’s so bad.  He screams himself to sleep.  Tomorrow comes.  Mother is high again.  Here we go.  Last night it was bad.  Now it’s good again.  And of course it will get bad again.  I don’t know why, but in time everything will change.  It’s terribly good (manic) and terribly bad (depressive).  Terrible describes both states because of the experienced reality that change will come suddenly, totally, and unpredictably.

I’m OK You’re OK, Thomas A. Harris, M.D., page 136