Sex worker and mother: managing dual and threatened identities

Abstract

A B S T RA C TThis paper draws on a qualitative study that sought to understand and develop theory based upon 24 women's subjective accounts of their childhood and adult experiences and involvement in sex work in the UK. It specifically examines the management of dual and threatened identities for the 17 women who were also mothers. To ensure the centrality of the women's voices in the analysis and theory generation, a grounded theory approach was taken using a psychosocial framework that drew on concepts of resilience to explore how the meanings of those experiences were reflectively appraised by participants. The findings indicate that there is a need to cope with the threat to identity inherent in society's diametrically opposed perceptions of sex worker and 'good mother' and simultaneously to manage the coexistence of the roles and identities of mother and sex worker. What appear significant in determining how these tensions are managed are the accumulated risk factors of early childhood, and the resources available to individuals in adulthood to manage both identities. Services must recognize not only individual but wider environmental and familial factors impacting on women with the dual identity of sex worker and mother in order to promote their resilience as mothers, whether living with or apart from their children.

Understanding the Impact of the Mother-Child Relationship on Sex Workers’ Decision to Enter and Leave the Streets – Lessons for Social Work Practice

“…Barry 1996). However, as doing sex work is often negotiated through different risks and stigma to achieve specific goals (Dodsworth 2014), the agency of these women, particularly in their roles as mothers, is less reported in current literature.…”

“…In this study, we consider the mother-child relationship context in examining their role as mothers and how their relationship with their children constrains or enables their exercise of agency (Chan and Goh 2014). Despite being active agents, their identities as mothers and street sex workers are often plagued with dilemmas and conflicts (Dodsworth 2014). These conflicting roles inevitably create a sense of ambivalence within them.…”

“…Others face the plight of having children removed by the government or placed under kinship care (Sloss and Harper 2004). It is common for sex workers who are mothers to see themselves as 'bad mothers', as their job is considered incongruous with the nurturing mothering role (Dodsworth 2014). Society's double standards, that a good mother should support her children 'but if the only way she can find to do this is sex work, she must be ashamed of it and hide it ' (Castañeda et al 1996, p. 240), has caused most of them to lead 'double lives', hiding their work from their children both at the time and after leaving the streets, due to shame.…”

Effects of Ecologically‐Based Family Therapy with substance‐using, prostituting mothers

“…The majority of women (91 per cent) engaging in prostitution have children in their care (Sloss, ). These women are typically single mothers who report high rates of removal of their children from their custody and poor mother‐child relationship quality (Dalla, ; Dodsworth, ). As a result, mothers engaged in prostitution report higher rates of stress associated with parenting compared to non‐prostituting women (Sloss and Harper, ).…”

“That’s not me anymore”: Resistance strategies for managing intersectional stigmas for women with substance use and incarceration histories

“…In response they resisted and viewed the messages as a manifestation of a double standard. Similarly, in Dodsworth’s study (2014), women actively embraced dual identities as sex workers and as mothers. Mothers saw sex work as a means of earning money that could choose to exit from, as opposed to a core attribute that reduces one’s claim to full personhood.…”