No abstract

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to gain a deeper understanding of the meaning of parents' everyday experiences after a major natural disaster. In-depth interviews were conducted with 13 parents who lived in the hurricane-damaged area. The essence of being a parent emerged as "struggling to rebuild family life." The struggles were superimposed on top of ongoing issues such as divorce and job responsibilities. Parents described feelings of being thankful to be alive, being overwhelmed, being limited by environmental aftereffects, being responsible for children, balancing needs and roles, constantly changing amidst uncertainty, and finding meaning in the disaster. Study findings support the need for nursing interventions that address family needs, support strengths, and involve parents as active decision makers.

A model of the relation between social support and maternal well-being was tested for mothers of distressed and normal newborns. It was hypothesized that the quality of the mother's closest relationship would mediate the link between social support and maternal affect, and that the mother s affect would, in turn, predict the mother's attitude toward the infant. Both the level of support provided by the close relation, and the extent to which the mother's expectations for support had been confirmed or disconfirmed were included as predictors in the proposed model. Participants were 47 mothers of infants treated in neonatal intensive care units and 36 mothers of healthy newborns. A path analysis provided support for the proposed model. Subsidiary analyses suggested that the fit of the model was somewhat better for mothers of distressed babies. The results suggest the importance of close relationships as mediators of well-being following major life transitions. Implications for intervention are discussed.The birth of a child represents an important transition for the infant's mother and her close social network members that may affect the quality of her interpersonal relationships, her personal well-being, and her attitudeThe authors gratefully acknowledge the nursing and medical staffs of Memorial Hospital, Hollywood, Florida and the private physicians who assisted with recruitment. We also express our appreciation to Carol Miller, Joan Austin, Steven Loveless, and James Rotton for their support of this project, and to the women who participated in this study. The article is based on a dissertation by Sherrilyn Coffman submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the doctoral degree at Indiana University.