Department of Anthropology, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam Government College, West Bengal State University, Rajarhat, Kolkata 7000163, India.
Department of Sociology, Maulana Azad College, University of Calcutta, Kolkata 700013, India.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2024 Apr 28;21(5):557. doi: 10.3390/ijerph21050557.
Undertaken in Kolkata, India, our study aimed to explore the experiences of Bengali middle-class women on perceived stressful events, social support, and coping experiences following childbirth. Becoming a mother following childbirth is a shared phenomenon irrespective of culture, social strata, or country, while stress during the postpartum period or depression is not. Discrete medical intervention does not sufficiently address the complexities of postpartum experiences since influencing factors also include economic, political, cultural, and social backgrounds. Adopting a feminist and phenomenological approach, individual in-person interviews were conducted with twenty women recruited via snowball sampling. Our findings revealed that events experienced as stressful may lead to poor postpartum well-being. Underpinned by gendered discourse and biases, stressful events included familial imperatives for a male child, poor social and emotional support from the family, mostly partners and fathers, and systemic workplace barriers. The women in our study commonly resided with their mothers postpartum. They expressed feeling sheltered from these experiences, cared for, and supported. We discuss the women's experiences from a feminist pragmatic worldview, which advocates for a flexible feminism recognizant of the unique and nurturing relationship experiences between Bengali middle-class women and their mothers. In conclusion, we advocate for culturally sensitive, women-centered postpartum care practices that may entail the inclusion of intergenerational care during this critical phase of maternal well-being. These insights underscore the necessity of tailoring postpartum support systems to align with the cultural and familial contexts of the individuals they serve.
我们在印度加尔各答开展的这项研究旨在探讨孟加拉中产阶级女性在产后经历的感知压力事件、社会支持和应对经验。无论文化、社会阶层或国家如何，产后成为母亲是一种普遍现象，但产后期间的压力或抑郁并非如此。单纯的医疗干预并不能充分解决产后体验的复杂性，因为影响因素还包括经济、政治、文化和社会背景。本研究采用女性主义和现象学方法，通过滚雪球抽样招募了 20 名女性进行个人面对面访谈。研究结果表明，被视为压力事件的事件可能会导致产后健康状况不佳。在性别话语和偏见的影响下，压力事件包括家庭对男性后代的期望、来自家庭的社会和情感支持不足，主要是伴侣和父亲，以及系统的工作场所障碍。我们研究中的女性通常在产后与母亲同住。她们表示，自己在这些经历中感到受到保护、被照顾和支持。我们从女性主义实用主义世界观的角度来讨论这些女性的经验，该观点倡导一种灵活的女性主义，承认孟加拉中产阶级女性与其母亲之间独特而富有滋养的关系经验。总之，我们提倡具有文化敏感性、以妇女为中心的产后护理实践，可能需要在这一关键的产妇健康阶段纳入代际护理。这些见解强调了需要根据他们所服务的个人的文化和家庭背景来定制产后支持系统。
