Women Studies
Hamideh Dabbaghi; Zeinab Rafieepour
Abstract
Motherhood is a central factor in the acquisition of women's identity, and it is crystallized as a clear, sacred, and consistent image in the gender socialization of women. Based on such a strong belief and core value around motherhood, infertility and not being a mother are considered a defect ...
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Motherhood is a central factor in the acquisition of women's identity, and it is crystallized as a clear, sacred, and consistent image in the gender socialization of women. Based on such a strong belief and core value around motherhood, infertility and not being a mother are considered a defect for women. Based on this, infertile women face many challenges and social problems beyond infertility, such as physical and medical issues, creating a different lived experience for them. After reviewing the theories of identity, interaction, cultural approaches, and biological-psychological-social approach, four concepts of infertility construction, infertility stigma, loss and grief, and role identity were used. Based on this, the central question of the current research is: what failures do infertile women perceive during their infertility experience, and what does it mean to them? This research is based on a qualitative approach and the application of thematic analysis using Max Q.D.A qualitative software. It is based on semi-in-depth and semi-structured interviews with 20 infertile women who live in Mashhad. The findings of this research show that women's experience of infertility refers to 3 main themes: suspended maternal identity, imperfect body perception and incomplete treatment.
