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    (c)     as in the case of any mammal, newborn human infants seek nourishment, and have
    an innate sucking reflex and an ability to "home in" on their biological mother; and

    (d)     newborn human infants bond and develop attachments - studies have
     demonstrated that newborn babies will seek the familiar in respect of the smell,
     appearance, feel and sounds of their environment and, in particular, of their biological mother.

7.   Understanding and accepting the primal relationship between a newborn human infant and his or her mother is fundamental to understanding the consequences of adoption upon the infant. Interference with this bond is a deeply traumatic event for the newborn even if the child is later placed with a loving adoptive mother.

8.   Nancy Verrier, in her work, The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child (Baltimore: Gateway Press, 1993), examines the impact on children who are adopted of the breaking of the biological maternal bond. A copy of Ms. Verrier's work is attached as exhibit "B" to my affidavit.

9.   The breaking of the bond, according to Ms. Verrier, is essential to understanding the development of children who are adopted or who are otherwise separated from their mothers during the time period immediately and shortly following birth. The sense of loss and unfamiliarity is intensely experienced but is not recognized or generally accepted within society as the profound, valid experience that it is.

 
 




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