Talleres educativos

There was a sense amongst many participants that they consciously minimised the impact of

HIV on their daily lives a finding that concurs with research reviewed in Chapter Two (Anderson et al. 2009, Stevens, and Hildebrandt 2006). However, this study highlights that mothers intentionally minimise HIV to focus on caring for their children.Within many of the narratives, being HIV positive did not appear to impinge largely on daily lives because most participants were physically well and compliant with medication. Even those who had HIV related complications did not elaborate about this in any detail. In this study, maintaining normalcy involves continuing with everyday mothering activities and dealing with their children’s needs

while keeping HIV in the background. Crossley’s (2000) and Ezzy’s (2000) earlier work with HIV

positive gay men in the pre-HAART era identified normalising the experience of being HIV positive as a positive coping strategy. These studies were illness-orientated, whereas in the current study, illness was not the focus and mothers face different life challenges to gay men. Mothers living with HIV concentrate on caring for their children and minimising the impact of HIV when possible. It appears this is a way to manage and deal with the condition,

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5.3.4 The importance of peer support

The mothers who had shared their diagnosis with family and friends described benefiting from the resultant support and practical help. In addition, they described a need to access support from outside the family and meet others in the same situation and this led them to access the HIV centre. Participants who had told no-one apart from their medical team also spoke about the importance of meeting peers, that is, others living with HIV. As noted earlier, the

experience of being an Irish-based asylum seeker can be isolating and so the HIV centre provided a social space for the migrant women who did not have the same support options as had the Irish mothers. This study’s narratives confirm that these women experience bonding social capital (Putman 1995), in this instance by meeting other HIV positive individuals at the HIV centre; attendance at the centre enhances their bonding social capital as meeting peers reduces isolation and allows for the development of enduring friendships. This is consistent with previous research on the support needs of HIV positive individuals (Bravo et al. 2010) and HIV positive women (Walsh et al. 2012, Foreman and Hawthorne 2007). Indeed, the role the HIV centre played in increasing bonding social capital of the participants is noteworthy, as it demonstrates the value of support, particularly peer support, for these mothers because of the exceptionality of being HIV positive.

5.3.5 Continuing to protect children

An important concern for some mothers in this study was the on-going protection of their children from HIV and this remained even after the confirmation of their children’s HIV

negative status. In some accounts, mothers expressed anxiety about possible contagion within family settings; even though they were very aware of how HIV is transmitted, they worried about they could infect their children through normal mother–child interactions or minor blood spills. This finding matches those observed in previous studies (Walulu 2011, Sayles et al. 2007, Long 2009b, 2006). Ingram and Hutchinson’s (2000, 1999) pre-HAART study proposed that MLH practice ‘defensive mothering’; one aspect of this includes mothers attempting to reduce the possibility of their HIV negative children encountering infected blood in the home. Possible HIV contagion remained a concern for some participants regardless of the low likelihood of transmission within the intimate family context, suggesting that they too practiced ‘defensive mothering’ (Ibid). Importantly, as discussed in Chapter Two, effective antiretroviral treatment reduces infectiousness (Persson 2012) and these mothers concerns

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about infecting their children is largely unfounded. The adoption of a narrative approach in this study revealed aspects of the maternal HIV experience that can remain unsaid, that is their heightened sense of perception of risk.

5.4 Conclusion

This Chapter considered how mothers deal with the consequences of an HIV diagnosis. The possible ramifications of the diagnosis for their children or unborn babies was a key concern for these women. The maternal HIV diagnosis experience involves a two-stage process; mothers are initially concerned with establishing their child’s HIV status and then subsequently deal with their own personal needs. It is apparent that HIV interferes with their lives as stigma remains a key issue for them, influencing how they deal with sharing their diagnosis with others. Disclosure is a complex process for mothers living with HIV and this study documents that revealing one’s diagnosis to significant others( including children) is difficult. Significantly, these findings reveal that for the mothers in this study their frame of reference was their children and families and they strove to maintain normalcy in their everyday family lives. Davis and Squire (2010) argue that HIV normalisation has resulted in a lessening of consideration of the psychosocial impact of being HIV positive. However, this study’s findings propose that HIV normalisation is context specific and it was noted that the personal biographies of women from Sub-Saharan Africa, where HIV is still considered a fatal condition, profoundly influenced their HIV experience.

These narratives endorse that an HIV diagnosis influences many aspects of mothering and being a mother shapes the experiences of HIV positive women.

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