The Historical Transformation of the Foster Mother’s Image and its Dependence on the Society

The article deals with the institute of a foster family and a number of its diVerences from the traditional one. The deWnition of a foster family is given. The structure and periods of stability / instability of a foster family as an open family system are described. A comparative analysis of the image of a biological and adoptive mother in the psychoanalytic and cultural traditions is made. The duality of archetypes (C. G. Jung) and diVerent levels of its implementation in the image of a mother: kind and wicked, are shown. The image of a good mother and a good enough mother (D. Winnicott) is analyzed. It is indicated that the mother provides normal development of a child through her adequate perception of reality, thus being a “mirror” in the eyes of a child. Attention is drawn to the emergence of neurosis in the child because of the absence of love and unconditional acceptance of him by the mother (K. Horney). A mother' image in the cultural traditions, of the mother who is protecting, loving, developing her child; alterations in the image of the mother for several centuries, its contradictions and uncertainties, dependence on the society in the Slavic tradition, are considered. Three images of a woman dependent on the expectations of a society are analyzed: of the mother, wife and woman freely promoted. Attention is paid to changes in the parent plants, causing the transformation of the concept of “normal parent relationship” (E. Badinter), the transformation of the image from the Blessed Virgin to the devil (T. Shishova), the controversial image of the mother, the myths of the perfect motherhood in the cultural traditions of the Slavic village. The work reveals the ambiguous and biased attitude of the society to the foster mother, the requirements of that society to conform to the ideal image of the mother, while viewing it as inherently a bad mother. The requirements of the society to be a perfect mother, the mother's own model of a good mother and the opinion of the society about the foster mother as a stepmother initiate foster mother's internal conXict of I-image.