Rachida Dati and her ill daughter

[Pennies]

I can't find a link anywhere but they're discussing it on the radio at the moment.

Rachida Dati - female French foreign minister who came under a lot of fire for going back to work 5 days after having a C-section to her first and only daughter and who continues to keep schtum about who the dad is, so effectively she is a single mum.

Well, her daughter is now 4 months old and was taken ill at the weekend and rushed to hospital whilst her in the care of Rachida's sister whilst RD was at a wedding. The baby remains in hospital and RD has gone on a trip to the Middle East (work related, not a holiday).

What do we all think of this?

TPF - I wholeheartedly agree with your last post. The way we act in circumstnaces like these says a lot about who we are.

As to PND - I don't know much about it (anything at all, I'm afraid), but would she be able to work at this level if she had it badly enough to affect her ability to bond to this extent?

Anthea turner eats babies?

Actually I'm not all that surprised.

As for this politician - the reason it has made the news is probably because she is a woman.

However, the fact is that whether male or female, as a single parent, the place to be is with your child if they are rushed to hospital.

The press make it a sex issue. And employers make it an issue by being inflexible.

And that's the definitive answer

Yes Pennies. Might be worth doing a bit of reading up on the net, people who are quite driven re work, housework, that kind of thing are often the ones you need worry about.

The idea that Rachida Dati has PND is absurd.

Care to qualify that Anna?

Narcissistic personality disorder (probably with some attachment issues) would be my diagnosis

good you all got your ICD-10 to hand for some idle gossip

LOL

I do rather enjoy a spot of idle diagnosis of some of the more out-there French parents at DD's school. for their children, however. Only yesterday I heard of one little girl who had been asked to repeat petite section (first year of pre-school eg 3 year olds) because of attachment issues... mother off abroad for up to a month at a time and the little girl spends weekends with her nanny...

I first saw this thread a few hours ago and did a web search on the subject in French as I was surprised not to have heard it on the French radio news.

The only pages I found were celebrity pages. According to this report she decided at the last minute to go on her business trip.

The child had a temperature and suspected infection.

I have left a baby (although not quite so young) with childminder with worse diagnosis because of commitments to a low flying job.

I wonder if perhaps the baby was only hospitalised because Rachida Dati is a celebrity/VIP/whatever

lets explore the princess anthea hypothesis.much more interesting

and yeah ICD and salacious goss any any ole day

Does anyone know what's wrong with the baby? Is it possible that the baby has something non life threatening and is doing fine, and based on the diagnosis, she feels happy going? Am sure she's in constant contact with doctors, and if anything changes, she would be back...

I don't know, but it's easy to jump to conclusions....

That's the point I'm trying to make, Ilovemydog.

I think we need some French perspective here. I was reading an interview with (French national heroine and female role model) film star Sophie Marceau in Madame Figaro recently and she was talking about how very maternal she was and backed this assertion up by saying that she took her children to school herself every morning and was very often home at night in time to tuck them in to bed .

it goes without saying as a working woman so called "career mum" RD will get a media bashing and some sad ole trite sterotypes trotted out about this.chuck in some cod psychiatry and Bowlby is your uncle

part of course when you work FT,people feel they can comment and opine

hope her child is ok

and i imagine Rachida gives not a flying fuck what is said about this

It is very tough....my natural reaction as a caring parent is one that would want to be with my child, but I am not career driven where I would have every move jugded as if I were a man. If she didn't go would there be calls for her to step down as she couldn't do her job etc? A job that she has clearly worked very hard for.

Doomed if she goes, doomed if she doesn't.

Maybe she has left her dd in the care of someone she trusts? Maybe she not that sick?

Maybe she is regretting having a child? Should she have had an abortion?

IT is very hard to judge when people don't behave as you woulc

I don't know anything about this issue and I'm slightly at the idea that any mother unnatural enough to leave her child must be mentally ill,

BUT I do take issue with BonsoirAnna's comment that it is absurd to suggest that Rachida Dati has PND.

How on earth would you know? People are often very successful at compartmentalising work and personal issues. Or are you suggesting that it is impossible to be a politician if you are suffering from depression? What about Winston Churchill, to take just one example?

Who knows what the facts are here? Until that point, it's all rather idle speculation.

Because she is behaving like a normal, standard, French career-focused mother, that's why . I think they are bonkers (they are usually very unpleasant human beings) but that is not related to motherhood but to their upbringing and environment which predates motherhood by a very wide margin.

Interestingly, I can't see the story in any of the mainstream French newspapers (online) which makes me wonder how much this attention this is actually getting in France outside the French trash sleb magazines and websites.

Not much

Could it be that French people generally don't care or is it a reflection that they give politicians a wide berth when it comes to their private lives or a combination of both?

BonsoirAnna

I take it you think most standard French career -focussed men are bonkers and unpleasant too?

Politicians can still have a private life in France unlike in the UK. People don't get as het up about them having mistresses.

But some of younger ones seek out celebrity.

Times they are a changin'

What's the logic there