By Gordon Welters

Giving motherly love and watching children of your own grow up cannot always be taken for granted. Mothers with a mental illness still have only
a very slim chance to look after their children. Their children have to be given to foster families or get adopted. Monika, Antonia, Sarah and Cindy were lucky. A pilot project gave Katrin, Annika, Kerstin and Melanie the opportunity to bring up their children themselves. It is not an easy task for the women. They alternate between closeness and distance, over-protectiveness and negligence. It is a long road the four are on and what lies at its end is as yet unknown.

To view the series by German photographer Gordon Welters, visit: http://www.gordonwelters.com/picture-storys/mothers/