When I was born, my mom got sick right after my birth. She had 9 surgeries in 5 years. I remember her being in hospital a lot. If I put myself in that position with my partner now, he'd probably be worried sick and not be able to properly care for a toddler, my mom has stories about her with baby me being in hospital full of opioids so she also was not in any position of caring correctly on an emotional level for a baby.

There's no 'blame' there. And it's the same for other stuff, a lot of times emotional neglect happens when a parent has issues of their own of some kind. It doesn't mean that this parent was not well-intended, just that something somehow went wrong.

It can still be traumatizing to a child to experience that, even if nobody wanted to hurt anyone. What matters is the reaction to such an event by the child/later adult.