Even if the literature about the difficulty of becoming a parent in a foreign country is now rich, there are fewer data about the impact of migration or psychological trauma on a parenting process already underway. This article aims to show the way parenthood can be harmed by traumatic events such as war and exile. Through the story of a mother who fled from sub-Saharan Africa with two of her children, we question the possibilities of putting the maternal function to work which, although impeded, can be subject to changes and reconsolidations, thanks to psychic work undertaken in the context of a transcultural setting. In this situation, the body is a privileged expression of the guilt and suffering of the family members. Considering the meaning of somatic symptoms and welcoming the singularity of each person, the transcultural group allows the family to find a narrative capacity and a way to co-construct a common narrative. The transcultural method, which recommends the use of psychoanalysis and anthropology in a non-merging and non-simultaneous way, allows therapists to rely on both singular and collective representations of the parental function. The presence of an interpreter, fulfilling the true role of cultural mediator, allows the use of the mother tongue and a privileged access to the inner intimate and emotional world of the family members in a familiar and reassuring environment. The analysis of certain parts of this therapy, bringing together in the same space a mother and her children, thus helps to clarify the various therapeutic levers that therapists resorted to in order to support the process of parenthood. © 2019 Elsevier Masson SAS

Maternal function Migration Exile Transcultural psychiatry Clinical setting Parenthood psychological trauma Body

cultural anthropology female battle injury Africa south of the Sahara transcultural care psychotrauma cultural psychiatry psychoanalysis mother child relation Article parenthood human migration