When the Bough Breaks is a 1947 film directed by Lawrence Huntington and starring Patricia Roc and Rosamund John. It is an adaptation of an original storyline by Herbert Victor on adoption and the competing ties of one child's birth and foster family.

Plot

After learning that her husband is a bigamist who already had a wife, new mother Lily Gardner (Patricia Roc) resolves to raise her baby, Jimmy, on her own under her maiden name of Lily Bates rather than give him up for adoption. Each day Lily leaves Jimmy at a day nursery while she works as a shopgirl at a department store, and then cares for Jimmy herself at night. Frances Norman (Rosamund John), a middle-class married woman who works at the day nursery to be around children after losing her own baby, is drawn to Jimmy. When Lily, under stress from her demanding schedule, becomes ill with flu, Frances persuades Lily to let her and her husband look after Jimmy temporarily. When Lily recovers, she visits Jimmy at the Normans' comfortable home. Seeing that Jimmy is happy and is receiving better food and care than she was able to manage, Lily agrees to let the Normans raise Jimmy, although she refuses to sign any legal document formally allowing them to adopt Jimmy. Lily eventually gives up on staying in touch with the Normans and drops out of Jimmy's life, although she misses him. The Normans do not tell Jimmy he is adopted and he regards them as his parents.