Long ago she forgot how to feel.  She retained only the most distant memory of what love was.  A part of her longed to possess it again,
 
When she saw the child, so full of love and light, she knew the child possessed that gift of love.  She thought if she could take the child; be with the child.  She would begin to feel and know love once more.
 
Unfortunately, all that would happen is that the child would turn into a distant frozen copy of her own heart.
The true tragedy of the fairy tale is a woman so brutalized by life that it left her unable to feel.