1st Edition
Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse and Midwifery Practice CSA, Birth and Powerlessness
By Lis Garratt
Copyright 2011
228 Pages
by
Routledge
228 Pages
by
Routledge
Also available as eBook on:
Many midwives will care for women who are survivors of childhood sexual abuse (CSA), whether these women disclose this or not. Pregnant and birthing women commonly experience their bodies becoming 'public property', a variety of sometimes intimate medical procedures, and limited choices on where and how care is provided. For CSA survivors, who have suffered loss of ownership over their bodies as... Read more
Introduction. What is childhood sexual abuse? How the research was conducted: the problems and dilemmas of dealing with such a topic. The interviews. How the interviewees responded. The impact of the research on me. What we already know about the impact of CSA on childbearing. Postnatal issues. The impact of caregivers. A life sentence: the effect of CSA on the interviewees’ daily lives. The uniqueness of trauma resulting from CSA. Vulnerability: the end result. The psychological needs of birthing women, post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic childbirth. Post-traumatic stress disorder. Re-enactment? The women’s experiences of giving birth. Powerlessness. Betrayal. Humiliation. CSA and midwives: the impact on midwives’ practice. What the midwife-survivors considered to be good practice. The pressure to conform. Coping with the inescapable: survivors’ dissociation, ‘professional dissociation’. ‘Professional dissociation’. What women want from their maternity carers and why the industrial model cannot deliver. The disempowerment of midwives. The separation of midwives and women. The disempowerment of women. Institutionalised childbirth and sexual abuse. Choice and control - the rhetoric. What is the answer? Conclusions drawn from the women’s positive experiences. Home birth — a different world. What can be done?
Biography
Lis Garratt
