Word: mothered
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...idealized picture of the American heartland, baseball, mom and apple pie feature prominently. The Italian version? Soccer, spaghetti and, yes, la mamma. But in recent years, the folkloric image of the doting Italian mother has been joined in the national consciousness by something a tad less idyllic: the mammone, or mama's boy, the hyper-coddled son (daughters are statistically less susceptible) who grows up so attached to his home, and to his mamma in particular, that he never really becomes independent or a self-sufficient...
...Still, the worst that these Italian mothers can usually be accused of is doting too much and not forcing their sons to grow up and do their own laundry. Now, however, in an extreme case that has made headlines across the nation, a court has been asked to consider whether a mother's love for her son - and that of his grandparents too - was so intense, it could be considered a form of child abuse...
...case centers on the overprotective mother and grandparents of a 12-year-old boy known only as Luca in the northern city of Ferrara. Prosecutors say the three built a wall of protection so high around the boy, it stunted his development. The boy's mother and grandfather have already been convicted of child abuse and are appealing the verdict. The grandmother appeared before a criminal tribunal earlier this month to face a similar charge. All three defendants have denied any wrongdoing, and the child has remained in the mother's custody while the case is being adjudicated. (Read "Custody...
...Considering the eternal debate in Italy over the country's supposedly overly sheltered mammone, the case has garnered widespread publicity. But the boy's plight doesn't exactly fit in with the national stereotype of an overprotective mother and her son - it's far messier than that. The parents divorced soon after the boy's birth and the father claimed that he wasn't permitted to see his son for nine years. Concerned about the child's welfare, he finally contacted social services and prosecutors opened an investigation into the mother and grandparents. (Read "What Women Want...
...sorts of problems in their children, from learning disabilities to teenage anorexia. "If you don't let your child discover the world, it can do real harm," says Henriette Felici-Bach, a child psychologist in Paris. "In these cases, the parent must be cured as well. If a mother is acting this way, it is because she is not well, she fears something that does not exist...