Growing up in a lone-parent family: variable settings and methods of intervention

The work contains a reflection from the clinical experience of the authors on the problems related to the reality of lone parent families. The case study concerns situations of mothers of male children who came to the observation in conjunction with adolescence of children, a particularly critical phase in contexts of single parenting. As a specific element of these situations, there is a tendency towards fusion that prevents the physiological process of separation and subjectivation and that also has an impact on the motivations that support the request for help. The authors therefore reflect on the need to identify different modes of intervention and see as the main discriminating element for the therapeutic indication the quality of the bond that characterizes the mother-son couple.