Mad mothers, bad mothers, & what a "good" mother would do : the ethics of ambivalence / Sarah LaChance Adams.

Sarah LaChance Adams gives a compelling account of maternal ambivalence. Taking the mother's conflicting needs and desires to nurture, on the one hand, and to be independent and free of care-taking responsibilities, on the other, as a model for the ethical relationship, she argues that all human relationships are ambivalent. Moreover, it is this ambivalence that makes them ethical. She shows how the conflict between care and independence is at the heart of all ethical relationships.