Postpartum Fatigue is a predominant concern of women after childbirth. Postpartum Fatigue is a pervasive and distressing experience that has negative health-related effects on women, infants, and families. Using grounded theory this study explored the process of postpartum fatigue in 13 women from diverse contexts in the six-week period after childbirth. The human process of Persevering emerged from the data. Persevering explained how participants continued Caregiving in the face of all but the most debilitating Postpartum Fatigue. Caregiving of the infant and older children was the outcome of the Persevering process. The need and ability to persevere emerged out of relationships between Postpartum Fatigue, Self-Transcendence, and Coping Techniques.Persevering is depicted by the model "Persevering through Postpartum Fatigue." The model has five major concepts: Influencing Factors, Postpartum Fatigue, Coping Techniques, Self-Transcendence, and Caregiving. Influencing Factors is a group of factors that participants identified as having the most influence on Postpartum Fatigue across the first six weeks postpartum. The three Influencing Factors were: Maternal-Infant Sleep Pattern Conflict, Infant Characteristics, and Fatigue Limiting Factors.Postpartum Fatigue was characterized by four dimensions: Mental, Physical, Stress-Worry, and Frustration. Each of these dimensions had empirical, context-dependent manifestations. Participants responded to Postpartum Fatigue by using a wide variety of Coping Techniques. Coping Techniques helped women manage Postpartum fatigue. Self-Transcendence was an ongoing human capacity called upon by the women to facilitate perseverance. Through the meaning and purpose ascribed to their infants and children, participants found the strength to persevere in caregiving through all but the most debilitating Postpartum Fatigue.The process of Persevering is explained through the relationships of Postpartum Fatigue, Coping Techniques, and Self-Transcendence. Profound negative feelings and an overwhelming desire to rest and sleep brought on by Postpartum Fatigue were offset by the use of Coping Techniques and Self-Transcendence, which enabled women to persevere in the provision of care to their children. "Persevering through Postpartum Fatigue" contributes a more explanatory view of Postpartum Fatigue as it is expressed in the everyday lives of postpartum women.

Throughout history, women have suffered from the mind/ body dualism, a major component of Western patriarchal ideology, which has consigned the body to women and the brain to men. Women's role is relegated to procreating, a "natural" act of the body that produces offspring, while men create, a conscious undertaking of the mind that brings something new into being. Women artists frequently confront continuous challenges to their creativity having to choose between mothering and artistic creation. Theorists like de Beauvoir saw the two as incompatible, three novels by Nancy Huston: La Virevolte (1994), Instruments des tenebres (1996) and Prodige (1999), seem in some ways to confirm that dilemma. Yet elsewhere this bilingual author affirms not only the possibility of combining them, but the importance of doing so to produce works that are feminine. Her work challenges the view of motherhood as metaphor in French feminist theory, as Huston relates that theory to practical concerns more often associated with anglophone feminist theory. A range of feminist works on maternity will be employed to examine the changing positions adopted in these novels, where the division between creation and maternity is primordial, but this split implies different results in each case. Instead of the traditional or feminist figure of motherhood, based on maternal love or instinct, the reader is confronted with specific types of conflict between mother and child.

Lesbian families with children are greater in number and more visible today than ever before. In fact, social scientists have suggested that we may be in the midst of a lesbian "baby boom". Canada's Census figures support this assertion. Between 2001 and 2006 there was a forty-seven per cent increase in households made up of two lesbian mothers and their children. This dissertation addresses the legal issues raised by lesbian motherhood, focusing primarily on legal parentage. It considers the terms upon which parental recognition has been achieved thus far, and evaluates the efficacy of a reform agenda focused exclusively on gaining access to the existing legal framework. To explore the legal and social dynamics of planned lesbian families, interviews were conducted with forty-nine lesbian mothers living in British Columbia and Alberta who conceived using assisted reproduction. Mothers were asked about the structure of their families, how they defined terms such as "parent" and "family", the extent to which they had engaged with law, and their recommendations for law reform. The interviews revealed that lesbian mothers define family and parenthood broadly, emphasizing intention and caregiving over a purely biological model of kinship. All of the mothers defined a "parent" as someone who intends to parent and, once a child is born, performs that intention through caregiving. Parental status was thus not limited to those who shared a biological relationship with a child, or even to two individuals. The research suggests that lesbian mothers have little interest in being subsumed into the existing legal framework which tends to prioritize dyadic and biological parenting. In fact, only a tiny portion of the mothers felt that identical treatment would adequately respond to their needs. The vast majority supported law reform that would extend to them the benefits of the current system, while simultaneously expanding the existing framework to include a wider variety of parental and family configurations within it. The reform model chosen to achieve this aim combined parental presumptions in favour of the lesbian couple or a single lesbian mother, with opt-in mechanisms that allowed the family to extend beyond the two parent unit.

Access to abstract permanently restricted to Ball State community only / Access to thesis permanently restricted to Ball State community only / Department of English

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Motherhood is one of the most enduring and consequential rites of passage to adult femininity for women. Indeed "motherhood changes everything" (Nelson 2009, p. 3, Fox 2009). However, not all women have access to motherhood. What happens then when women do not have access to the gender ideal of motherhood or to the cultural spaces that define it? How do women deal with this exclusion? In the course of this research I answer these two questions through an examination of women’s blogging in the online infertility community. Women in the online infertility community characterize their fertility challenges as unfair and unjust, wherein their expressions of desire to become mothers are made in direct relation to, and in comparison with, the women around them who are on their way to becoming mothers (i.e., pregnant) or have already become mothers. In characterizing their experience as an injustice, I argue that women begin to lay claim to motherhood as an entitlement. They do so by drawing on, engaging with, and seeking out a multiplicity of cultural and scientific discourses associated with motherhood and women’s bodies. Through an examination of these discourses, I argue that the pursuit of motherhood is a journey that is relational and comparative, and one that happens in a single-gender, homo-social environment. Conceptualizing motherhood as a gendered entitlement, rather than a gender identity achievement allows us to recognize that women’s relationality and sociality are central to how women negotiate gender norms and expectations more broadly. In the face of infertility women in the online community express incredulity about the prospect of never having a biological child of their own and become industrious in navigating their circumstances. Their industrious responses help us locate infertility as a gendered penalty in the larger context of misfortune, which is often overlooked by sociologists.

Motherhood is one of the most enduring and consequential rites of passage to adult femininity for women. Indeed "motherhood changes everything" (Nelson 2009, p. 3, Fox 2009). However, not all women have access to motherhood. What happens then when women do not have access to the gender ideal of motherhood or to the cultural spaces that define it? How do women deal with this exclusion? In the course of this research I answer these two questions through an examination of women’s blogging in the online infertility community. Women in the online infertility community characterize their fertility challenges as unfair and unjust, wherein their expressions of desire to become mothers are made in direct relation to, and in comparison with, the women around them who are on their way to becoming mothers (i.e., pregnant) or have already become mothers. In characterizing their experience as an injustice, I argue that women begin to lay claim to motherhood as an entitlement. They do so by drawing on, engaging with, and seeking out a multiplicity of cultural and scientific discourses associated with motherhood and women’s bodies. Through an examination of these discourses, I argue that the pursuit of motherhood is a journey that is relational and comparative, and one that happens in a single-gender, homo-social environment. Conceptualizing motherhood as a gendered entitlement, rather than a gender identity achievement allows us to recognize that women’s relationality and sociality are central to how women negotiate gender norms and expectations more broadly. In the face of infertility women in the online community express incredulity about the prospect of never having a biological child of their own and become industrious in navigating their circumstances. Their industrious responses help us locate infertility as a gendered penalty in the larger context of misfortune, which is often overlooked by sociologists.

Although the position of mothers has changed considerably since the beginning of the twentieth century, an idealised notion of motherhood persists. The cinema provides a source of information about attitudes towards mothering in Australian society which is not diminished by the fact that mothers are often marginal to the narrative. While the study recognises that cinematic images are not unconditionally authoritative, it rests on the belief that films have some capacity to reflect and influence society. The films are placed in an historical context with regard to social change in Australian society, so that the images can be understood within the context of the time of the making and viewing of the films. The depictions of the mother are scrutinised with regard to her appearance, her attitude, her relationship with others and the expectations, whether explicit or implicit, of her role. Of particular significance is what happens to her during the film and whether she is punished or rewarded for her behaviour. The conclusions reached after analysis are used to challenge those ideas which assume that portrayals of motherhood are unchangeable and timeless. The study examines Australian feature films from 1900 to 1988. To augment its historical focus, it uses sociological, psychoanalytical and feminist theoretical writing with special relevance for motherhood and mothering practice. Looking at areas of importance to mothers, it comprises an exploration of what makes a mother good or bad; the significance of the birth of female and male children; the relationship of mothers to daughters; the mother's sexuality and the metaphor of the missing mother. It shows that images of motherhood on screen are organised according to political, social and economic requirements in the community. Further, films frequently show mothers in traditional roles which are useful for maintaining notions of patriarchal privilege in society. The analysis exposes stereotypical depictions of motherhood which are often inaccurate, unfair and oppressive to women.