The Ghost Of The Mother,Edward Emery.

The effect that mourning had on the personality of the mother brought them to ideas centred on the child. Geoffrey knew that John had read the thesis by Edward Emery a psychoanalyst who had written  on’ The Ghost Of The mother’. This paper examined the mourning of a mother for a young child and how adversely it affects the personality of the mother.

This avid discourse led into ideas relating to the seed of the personality and the realisation that there can be no fairground freak or dislocated personality that has not lain, at some  time within the womb of a beloved mother and that is both our genetic make-up and our actions that reveal who we are ;wonderful or otherwise.Eventually they concluded that to handle the human personality is to handle that which is both unknown and unpredictable.

Morning came and it lead to a deeper wondering. There was some aspect of this darkness that was drawing him ever closer. Why he wondered had he   failed to spot it when he was abroad.He considered the possibility of some psychotic breakdown or even a bipolar catastrophe.

PARADISE LOST

‘I never knew you loved her. I didn’t know you loved her. Why did you have to love her?She  was a drunk.She was vile,but you had to love her didn’t you? Why didn’t you take me away from her, leave her divorce her- anything but no, you just stayed and stayed and stayed. To stay that was always your mantra. You could escape to work. Never mind if she left me in the cupboard without food or drink. I was unable to escape.I was so frightened I used to wet myself. I wanted to be with you.You didn’t want that. i wanted to be with you.’

‘ What happened Judith, tell me what happened’Sam said softly.

” You happened, mum happened, I happened. Why did you have  child with a woman like that?- How could you?

‘ She wasn’t like that when I met her. I’ve explained to you, after Harry died she changed;she never got over Harry’s death. She loved him so much.’

‘ Claude told me about Van Gogh’s mother….the mourning mother syndrome. I was never good enough. I wasn’t Harry. She wanted something, someone else not me.’