A great deal of evidence suggests that the ability to form a stable relationship
begins in infancy, in a child's earliest experiences with a caregiver who reliably meets the infant's needs for food, care, protection,
stimulation, and
social contact.
During infancy, parents provide primarily for infants» basic needs for sustenance, protection, comfort,
social interaction and
stimulation; by toddlerhood, as children
begin to walk and talk, parents must also set age - appropriate limits on exploration while encouraging cognitive,
social and language development.1 The challenges of parenting young children are best met when the mother has adequate emotional support and help with child care and is emotionally stable herself.