WOMEN, MOTHERS AND MANDALAS: GUIDE TO CREATING A SHARED SUPPORT GROUP BETWEEN PREGNANT WOMEN
Health education; Gestation; Mutual aid group; Women
During pregnancy, women go through a series of physical, mental and social changes that, as a consequence, can generate anxiety and fears. One of the ways of coping with this situation is the involvement in support groups shared between women who live the same process. This study seeks, through the involvement of the researcher herself, to present an illustrated guide to support the creation and development of these groups. This work focuses on my experiences and implications as a woman and active pregnant woman, in addition to creating a group of pregnant women in the municipality of Caicó. It is a qualitative and descriptive research, which uses self-ethnography as a methodology, which is characterized by a writing of the “I” that allows us to reflect on our own experience, or from it, to analyze questions of society and / or culture to which it belongs. For data collection, reflections, memories and the researcher's field diary written during the observation of virtual meetings of groups of pregnant women were used. From the experience of the researcher, mobilized by the development of the group, emerging themes related to her life trajectory during pregnancy / motherhood were highlighted, namely: “She doesn't pull, she inherits”; "My treasure"; “When a child is born, a mother is born (?)”; "Don't leave me alone" and "Each one knows the pain and the delight of being what he is". Based on this thematic analysis, a guide was created to facilitate the creation of groups of pregnant women. We concluded that the groups of pregnant women should be stimulated, as they are configured as spaces of care among the participants and that their creation must consider the bond between women and the culture of the place where it will be implemented.