Women’s Experience of Birth: Childbirth as a Rite of Passage

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-56 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Reed ◽  
Margaret Barnes ◽  
Jennifer Rowe
Keyword(s):  
Sense Of Self ◽  
External World ◽  
Rite Of Passage ◽  
Transformative Experience ◽  
Birth Stories ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Women's Experience ◽  
Altered State Of Consciousness

BACKGROUND: Within midwifery, there is a move toward reclaiming and promoting physiological birth. Because midwifery is woman-centered in nature, it is essential that the experience of birth is understood from the woman’s perspective. To date, there has been little research focusing exclusively on women’s experience of physiological birth.AIM: The aim of this study was to explore women’s experiences of physiological birth.METHOD: A narrative approach was taken, and in-depth face-to-face interviews were used to gather birth stories. The participants were 10 women who had recently experienced a physiological birth. Data were analyzed to identify themes occurring across the narratives.FINDINGS: The findings are presented within the explanatory framework of childbirth as a rite of passage composing of three phases: separation, liminal, and incorporation. During birth, women separated from the external world and sought to minimize external and internal distractions. In the liminal phase, they entered “their own world” and experienced an altered state of consciousness. After their baby was born, they reintegrated with the external world and incorporated their birth experience into their sense of self.CONCLUSION: The findings of this study suggest that women’s experiences during physiological birth are multidimensional and not aligned with biomedical descriptions of physically defined stages of labor. Birth was an empowering and transformative experience for the women in the study. The rites of passage framework may assist with developing a discourse about birth that resonates with women’s experiences.

Feminine Habitus

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelly H. Chong
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
South Korea ◽  
Small Group ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Spiritual Practices ◽  
Group Culture ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Evangelical Churches ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Cell Groups

This chapter explores middle-class women's experiences and encounters with evangelicalism and patriarchy in South Korea, which is renowned for the phenomenal success of its evangelical churches. It focuses on a female, small-group culture to study the ways women become constituted as new feminine subjects through the development of a novel evangelical habitus—one that is constituted by new dispositions, both embodied and linguistic, and is developed through ritualized rhetorical, bodily, and spiritual practices. Through participation in cell groups, the chapter reveals how women sought healing for experiences of “intense domestic suffering,” notably when attempts at other solutions failed, such as psychotherapy or shamanistic intervention. Yet in spite of the empowered sense of self that many achieved through these therapeutic, charismatically oriented communities, women were still resubjugated to the structures of social and religious patriarchy.

scholarly journals The storying of birth

2020 ◽  
pp. 136345932092586
Author(s):  
Jennifer MacLellan
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
The Self ◽  
Control Mechanisms ◽  
Cultural Meanings ◽  
Birth Stories ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Birth Narratives ◽  
Selection Of

Birth narratives have been found to provide women with the most accessible and often utilised means for giving voice to their exploration of meaning in their births. The stories women tell of their birth come out of their pre- and post-experience bodies, reproducing society through the sharing of cultural meanings. I recruited a selection of 20 birth stories from a popular ‘mums’ Internet forum in the United Kingdom. Using structural and thematic analyses, I set out to explore how women tell the story of their body in childbirth. This project has contributed evidence to the discussion of women’s experiences of subjectivity in the discursive landscape of birth, while uncovering previously unacknowledged sites of resistance. The linguistic restrictions, sustained by the neoliberal control mechanisms on society and the self, act to shape the reality, feelings, and expressions of birthing women. Naming these silencing strategies, as I have done through the findings of this project, and celebrating women’s discourse on birth, as the explosion of birth stories across the Internet are doing, offer bold moves to challenge the muting status quo of women in birth. Reclaiming women’s language for birth and working to create a new vocabulary encapsulating the experiences of birthing women will also present opportunities for the issue of birth and women’s experiences of it to occupy greater political space with a confident and decisive voice.

scholarly journals ‘Do you mean I’m not whole?’: Exploring the role of support in women’s experiences of mastectomy without reconstruction

2016 ◽  
Vol 23 (12) ◽  
pp. 1598-1609 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephanie Archer ◽  
Fiona G Holland ◽  
Jane Montague
Keyword(s):  
Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
The Self ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Younger Women ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Positive Support ◽  
Unilateral Mastectomy

This study explores the role of others in supporting younger women who opt not to reconstruct their breast post-mastectomy. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with six women diagnosed with breast cancer in their 30s/40s. The women lived in England, had been diagnosed a minimum of 5 years previously and had undergone unilateral mastectomy. An interpretative phenomenological analysis revealed three themes: Assuring the self: ‘I’ll love you whatever’, Challenging the self: ‘Do you mean I’m not whole?’ and Accepting the self: ‘I’ve come out the other side’. The women’s experiences of positive support and challenges to their sense of self are discussed.

Limits of the Appeal to Women's Experiences Reconsidered

Horizons ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 33 (01) ◽  
pp. 54-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Beste
Keyword(s):  
Feminist Theology ◽  
Moral Knowledge ◽  
Trauma Theory ◽  
Martha Nussbaum ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Women's Experience ◽  
Postmodern Thought ◽  
Credible Source

ABSTRACTIn the light of what appears to be a growing consensus that historicist and postmodern thought undermines the credibility of appeals to women's experience as a source of theological and moral knowledge, I assess whether these criticisms do indeed discredit appeals to experience as a legitimate source of knowledge and norm for feminist theology. While such critiques pose insightful challenges to assumptions underlying the appeal to experience, I argue that they do not definitively discredit the appeal to experience itself. Drawing on trauma theory and the work of Margaret Farley and Martha Nussbaum, I seek to show how women's experiences can be defended as a credible source of knowledge and a norm for feminist theology.

scholarly journals Older Women’s Experiences of Aging and Health: An Interpretive Phenomenological Study

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 233372141983430 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dympna Tuohy ◽  
Adeline Cooney
Keyword(s):  
Older Women ◽  
Health Care Services ◽  
Phenomenological Study ◽  
Individual Case ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Care Services ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Women's Experience ◽  
Aging And Health ◽  
Major Factors

Objective: This interpretive phenomenological study explored older Irish women’s experiences of aging and health related issues. Method: Data were collected using in-depth interviews with 23 older women (coresearchers). Data analysis followed the “Vancouver school of doing phenomenology” framework and included a meta-synthesis of individual case constructions. Results: “Retaining autonomy within a process of adaptation and continued engagement” describes the essential meaning of coresearchers’ experiences. Four themes were identified: “Being in control: Balancing needs and supports,” “Navigating a changing world,” “Being connected and involved,” “Trying to stay well.” Discussion: Gender shapes older women’s experience of aging, health, and ill health. Three major factors moderate their experience: autonomy and control, proactivity and adaptability, and staying engaged with life. The study concludes that aging, gender, and health are intrinsically linked and collectively shape older women’s experience. This is an important consideration when planning gender-appropriate health care services for older women.

Nonphysical Abuse and Coercive Control

2021 ◽  
pp. 31-61
Author(s):  
Heather Douglas
Keyword(s):  
Emotional Abuse ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Linguistically Diverse ◽  
Culturally And Linguistically Diverse ◽  
Coercive Control ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Financial Abuse ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Diverse Backgrounds ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter explores women’s experiences of nonphysical forms of abuse. Most women reported that the most difficult form of abuse they dealt with was nonphysical abuse, especially emotional abuse. Many women stated that nonphysical abuse deeply impacted on their sense of self and freedom and that it continued to affect them years after they separated from an abusive partner. Other forms of nonphysical abuse that the women highlighted included abusive tactics targeting their role as a mother, isolation within the relationship, and financial abuse. This chapter also considers the particular impacts of nonphysical abuse, including isolation, financial abuse, and threats about their visas, for women from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, especially those with insecure visa status.

Exploring Some Swedish Women’s Experiences of Support During Childbirth

2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 183-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Astrid Nystedt ◽  
Lisbeth Kristiansen ◽  
Kerstin Ehrenstråle ◽  
Ingegerd Hildingsson
Keyword(s):  
Social Support ◽  
Grounded Theory ◽  
Study Design ◽  
Birth Experience ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Pregnancy And Childbirth ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Women's Experience ◽  
Open Coding

BACKGROUND: Caregivers need to better understand women’s experiences of support during childbirth because research suggests that social support positively influences childbirth.AIM: This study describes women’s experiences of support given by caregivers during pregnancy and childbirth.METHOD: The study design was inspired by grounded theory. Seven interviews of women were analyzed with an open coding, and different time-related categories related to the childbirth process emerged. The categories were marked by fear and a negative birth experience, being guided on own terms, feel supported, and transformation into courage to give birth. The analysis continued with a selective coding, reflecting the process of mistrust to trust in caregivers.FINDINGS: The mistrust in caregivers began with feelings of fear of birth and a negative birth experience. Through being guided on own terms and feeling supported by the caregivers, a trusting relationship could be established. If the trusting relationship continued during labor, then a woman could transform the fear of birth into the courage to give birth.CONCLUSIONS: Women’s experience of support can be seen as a product of earlier experiences from interactions with caregivers. Therefore, caregivers must be sensitive to the potential power and far-reaching consequences their actions can have.

Immediate Breast Reconstruction

2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Avital Gershfeld Litvin ◽  
Rebecca Jacoby
Keyword(s):  
Breast Reconstruction ◽  
Qualitative Analysis ◽  
Immediate Breast Reconstruction ◽  
Women’S Experiences ◽  
Women's Experiences ◽  
Women's Experience ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Continuous Narrative ◽  
Reconstructed Breast

This article represents findings of a qualitative analysis of interviews with women age 30 to 64 years ( n = 14) who had undergone immediate breast reconstruction (IBR) following mastectomy. The purpose of the study was to explore women’s experiences for electing IBR. According to our analysis, women experienced mastectomy as a disability, and their expectations of IBR to restore their sense of normalcy were not fulfilled. Most women perceived the reconstructed breast mainly as a visual replacement. Women’s experience formed a continuous narrative from the moment of diagnosis, through mastectomy until the completion of the reconstruction.

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