Experiences of Maternal Birth Injuries : How Gender and Sexuality Norms Affect Diagnostics, Everyday Life and Healthcare in Sweden

Abstract: This thesis explores women’s experiences of maternal birth injuries, focusing on how gender and sexuality norms affect diagnostics, everyday life and healthcare in Sweden. The empirical material consists of 383 answers to an online questionnaire. The theoretical approaches are centred on how bodies are viewed and valued in a Western society, especially in connection to the social construction of health and illness in relation to gender and reproduction. Existing medical descriptions of maternal birth injuries are explored in comparison to the participants’ own definitions. No clear definition is found and the analysis demonstrates that maternal birth injuries can cause both mental and physical injuries/consequences, arising from both vaginal and caesarean births, and a shift away from mainly focusing on physical damage caused by vaginal delivery is suggested. Everyday life is affected in several ways by the complications that the birth injuries lead to, and many participants suffer severely, both physically and mentally. A majority of the participants seek care for these complications, and their experiences of Swedish healthcare reveal an attitude wherein maternal birth injuries are seen as something normal. Many do not receive sufficient care, if treated at all, and gender and sexuality norms affect how medical personnel act and speak. This demonstrates patriarchal structures, medical hierarchies and heterosexual norms within Swedish healthcare, which devalue female-coded bodies as well as their pain and pleasures. Hence, this thesis addresses the importance of researching the effect of underlying structures on care of women in general, and of maternal birth injuries in particular.