Interviews with 21 women in a rural Colorado county yielded personal descriptions of isolation and the feelings and strategies that exist in response to isolating events and circumstances. Isolation emerged as three distinct categories of relational disconnection: from specific individuals; from nonspecific others, such as groups or the larger community; or as a combination of both. Factors affecting relational disconnection were choice, control, and duration. Women who had the support of significant others and those who connected with themselves through self-talk or the achievement of goals were often able to move beyond the isolating situation and successfully reconnect.Social workers and other human services professionals who attempt to address the specific needs of rural women can expect to encounter a scarcity of literature in this area. In lamenting the near absence of investigations into the experiences of rural women, Cheitman (1981) stated: &dquo;The worst kind of oppression and inequality occurs to groups that are, in effect, 'invisible.' If no one has identified rural women as an oppressed class and is asking questions about them, whence will come the solutions to problems?&dquo; (p. 19). In addition to the lack of focus upon rural women, rurality is often stereotyped negatively and labeled as isolating (Cheitman, 1981). As students and a faculty member in a graduate social work program with a rural community
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