不妊をめぐる苦悩の体験プロセスについて

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to clarify the kinds of suffering in connection with infertility and what processes the suffering follows through analysis of the narrations by women who experienced infertility. The subjects were 24 women. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews in which the subjects reported their experiences of infertility. Their reports were analyzed through a Modified Grounded Theory Approach. Their experiences could be divided into 4 large categories those are "relation to the world", "relation to medical treatment", "relation by to life", "relation by to an identity". An examination of these categories showed that the suffering in connection with infertility is experienced in various situations. It is thought that it is experienced while moving cyclically, coming and going in the overlapping of these relations. Moreover, in the meaning that it is possible by acquisition of an alternative posture that the form of each relation changes while receiving the question deepened in the motion, or infertility, this circulation can also be considered as a thing like the motion which is not a motion of a plane and draws a three-dimensional spiral. Future studies will examine the diversity of the subjective experience by infertile women from the viewpoint of their individuality and history based on the results of this research.