ABSTRACT Childbirth is widely considered to be a bonding experience among women. Women often feel compelled to share their story, and this research highlights communicative and reflexive aspects of storytelling as a means for meaning-making and relationship-building. This inductive thematic analysis explored 22 women’s motivations for engaging in storytelling about birth across five focus groups and two one-on-one interviews. Findings demonstrate one primary theme, building motherwisdom, a term coined here to reflect the uniqueness of the birth storytelling context. We also identified three secondary themes for motivation to engage in birth storytelling: (1) fulfilling a sense of responsibility to share one’s story to normalize a variety of birth experiences and to listen to learn about birth, (2) empowering women, and (3) seeking validation. Women receive positive therapeutic benefit from storytelling, and this may be particularly important in maintaining and improving mental health during the postpartum period. Our work informs the environments we can create to motivate mothers to share and listen to birth stories to foster this benefit.

中文翻译：

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“我们的出生经历是我们的纽带”：女性讲述出生故事以建立母性的动机

摘要 分娩被广泛认为是女性之间的一种亲密体验。女性经常觉得有必要分享她们的故事，这项研究强调了讲故事的交流和反思方面，作为意义制定和建立关系的一种手段。这项归纳性主题分析通过五个焦点小组和两次一对一访谈，探讨了 22 位女性参与讲述生育故事的动机。调查结果展示了一个主要主题，即建立母性，这是一个在这里创造的术语，以反映出生故事背景的独特性。我们还确定了参与出生故事讲述动机的三个次要主题：(1) 履行责任感，分享自己的故事，使各种出生经历正常化，并倾听了解出生的信息，(2) 赋予妇女权力，以及 (3) ) 寻求验证。女性从讲故事中获得积极的治疗益处，这对于维持和改善产后心理健康可能尤为重要。我们的工作为我们可以创造的环境提供信息，以激励母亲分享和聆听出生故事，以促进这种好处。