Reva rubin maternal role attainment

Research Article Critique

CLINICAL SCHOLARSHIP

The Concept of Motherhood Among Three Generations of African American Women Katherine Ferrell Fouquier, PhD, RN, CNM1

1 Epsilon Alpha, Post-Doctoral Fellow, Byrdine F. Lewis School of Nursing, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA

Key words African American, motherhood, maternal role

attainment, maternal identity, hermeneutic

phenomenology, media and motherhood

Correspondence Katherine Ferrell Fouquier, Byrdine F. Lewis

School of Nursing, Georgia State University, P.

O. Box 4019, Atlanta, GA 30302–4019.E-mail:

mfouquier1@gsu.edu

Accepted February 12, 2011

doi: 10.1111/j.1547-5069.2011.01394.x

Abstract

Purpose: To provide an understanding of the experiences of three generations of African American women in the transition to motherhood. Design and Methods: Hermeneutic phenomenology from an Afrocentric feminist perspective is the methodological approach used in this study. Using the snowball technique, a purposive sample of 18 African American women from three generations who were mostly middle class, partnered, and edu- cated was recruited. Individual open-ended interviews were used to identify information-rich cases that would provide an in-depth understanding of the phenomenon. Generation 1 included seven women, between the ages of 65 and 83 years, who became mothers between 1950 and 1970, prior to the Civil Rights Movement. Generation 2 included five women, between the ages of 51 and 58 years, who became mothers between 1971 and 1990, after the Civil Rights Movement. There were six women in Generation 3, between the ages of 30 and 41 years, who became mothers between 1991 and 2003. Findings: Three constitutive patterns and their associated themes were iden- tified. The first pattern, It Took Me a Minute, had three themes: Finding Out, Realizing What Mothers Do, and Way Tricked! The second pattern, Preserving Our Home, had four themes: Mothering Within the isms: Racism, Classism, and Sexism, I Did the Best I Could, Mothers and Others, and Spiritual Moth- ers. Eat the Meat, Throw Away the Bone, the third pattern, had two themes: The Ways in Which We Learn and Someone Who Looks Like Me. Conclusions: The results of this study reveal some consistency with current descriptions of maternal identity and becoming a mother and add to our un- derstanding of the complexities that racism, classism, and sexism play in the lives of African American mothers and their families. The data from this study also suggest that future development of theoretical frameworks and analyti- cal tools, used to assess the effects of stress and other psychosocial factors on health, need to be grounded in a historic understanding of the African Ameri- can experience and of the African influence on family and cultural knowledge. Additionally, this study demonstrated the impact that the media, both profes- sional and mass media outlets, have in defining and perpetuating our beliefs and feelings of the “good mother—bad mother” dualism. The description of motherhood for this group of African American women illustrates that moth- erhood is a source of power and provides significant meaning, satisfaction, and respect within the family and the larger community. It also highlighted the communal role that “othermothers” and spiritual mothers have in facilitating the transition to motherhood and providing strong social support.

Journal of Nursing Scholarship, 2011; 43:2, 145–153. 145 C© 2011 Sigma Theta Tau International

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Clinical Relevance: Analysis of the stories in this study adds to the current lit- erature on becoming a mother and Black feminist descriptions of motherhood. This study adds to our understanding of how negative portrayals of African American mothers and the lack of representation in the media perpetuate neg- ative stereotypes of African American motherhood. The stories, told by the 18 women in this study, provide a positive description of African American moth- erhood.

The transition to motherhood is both an individual process and one that is influenced by a combination of social, political, cultural, and environmental factors. Current theories such as Rubin’s maternal identity and Mercer’s theory on maternal role attainment (MRA) incorporate variables that address individual traits as well as sociopolitical and cultural context (Mercer, 2010; Rubin, 1984). However, these variables were developed and tested from the perspective of White, middle-class, partnered women. The experiences of other groups, such as African American women, have been judged against this standard, and cross-cultural relevance of these theo- ries has not been assessed (Sawyer, 1999). When African American women are included in research, they are of- ten poor, single, teenage mothers and their experiences have not been described within the context of the African American worldview, where groupness, community, and extended family networks are valued (Baldwin, 1996; Sawyer, 1999). Viewing the transition to the maternal role among African American women through a Euro- centric lens serves to reinforce negative stereotypes per- petuating racial and ethnic disparities. Reliance on re- search that has not examined the effects of race, class, and gender-specific experiences has limited our under- standing of MRA within the African American commu- nity. The literature lacks the discourse of African Amer- ican women that describes how they experience the maternal role with respect to cultural, historical, political, and economic constraints (Sawyer, 1999).

The nineteenth century’s idealized view of the “good mother” continues to be the standard by which women’s real life experiences as mothers are judged (O’Reilly, 2004). African American women, who do not fit the White, middle-class, Western standard of moth- erhood, may find their experiences as mothers de- graded. Societal norms, which influence our daily behaviors, perpetuate the “good mother–bad mother” di- chotomy and reinforce negative descriptions of mother- hood among African American women (O’Reilly, 2004).

Care providers have not been immune to the stereotyp- ical representation of African American women as poor, single, and uneducated. This study adds to our under- standing of how African American women conceptual-

ize motherhood. Their stories describe the ways in which race, class, and gender can intersect and what this means in the transition to motherhood. The goal of this study was to reorient the definition of motherhood among African American women in a way that more closely re- flects their lived experience.

Theoretical Background

The theories of maternal identity and maternal role at- tainment, developed and tested from the 1950s to the 1970s, do not reflect the radical changes in the insti- tutions of marriage and motherhood that evolved from the Women’s Movement and the Civil Rights Movement. Rubin’s pioneer work on maternal identity provided de- scriptions of the subjective experience of childbearing and laid the foundation for subsequent studies of maternal- infant relationships (Gay, Edgil, & Douglas, 1988). Using data collected from naturalistic field studies, Rubin observed that in order for a woman to assume a mater- nal identity, there were four maternal tasks that had to be accomplished. These tasks were: (a) seeking safe pas- sage for herself and her child, (b) ensuring acceptance of the child by significant others, (c) binding-in to the unborn child, and (d) learning to give of herself (Gay et al., 1988; Rubin, 1984). This framework provided an understanding of the childbearing women’s experiences, which enriched the effectiveness of nurses and healthcare providers in addressing the needs of women during their transition to motherhood. Among nurse researchers, this theory has had little usefulness; it is rarely cited as a the- oretical framework, possibly due to complexity and lack of clarity between concepts, constructs, and variables.

Mercer, a student of Rubin, began development of her theory of MRA in the 1960s. She defined MRA as “a process in which the mother achieves competence in the role and integrates the mothering behaviors into her established role set, so that she is comfortable with her identity as a mother” (Mercer, 1985, p. 198). The four major concepts of the theory are: (a) the mother’s self-system is made up of the ideal self, the self-image, and the body image; (b) there is a reciprocal interplay between the mother’s self-system and the infant; (c)

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role strain; and (d) the mother’s perceived quality of role performance (Mercer, 1985, 2010). Mercer (2010) went on to describe maternal role attainment as a pro- cess that involved four stages: anticipatory, formal, in- formal, and personal. As the woman progresses through these four stages, she moves from learning the expecta- tions of the role to following the rules and directives of others and mimicking the mothering behaviors of role models, to finally developing her own unique set of ma- ternal behaviors and gaining confidence and competence in her decisions and performance of her mothering skills. Mercer proposed that the term maternal role attainment be replaced with becoming a mother (BAM). She rea- soned that the theory of MRA did not adequately describe the ways in which mothering changes as she and her chil- dren grow and mature (Mercer, 2010).

While both of these theories provided a foundation for understanding how women make the transition to motherhood, neither is sensitive to the effects that race, class, and gender may have on the maternal role among African American women. Additionally, the theories may not reflect the social changes brought on by the femi- nist movement and the Civil Rights Movement in the late 1960s. It has been well documented that the sec- ond wave feminist movement challenged the cultural pressure for White women to become mothers. The dis- course of African American women from this era, describ- ing how they experience the maternal role with respect to the cultural, historical, political, and economic con- straints, has been ignored.

Methods

Hermeneutic phenomenology from an Afrocentric feminist perspective is the methodological approach used for this study. Hermeneutics is a research method that seeks to interpret the human experience of the world through the use of language to provide both understand- ing and knowledge (Draucher, 1999). Interpretation of the stories from an Afrocentric feminist perspective pro- vides a more complete and less distorted vision of moth- ering than those that have been defined by the dominant culture. The Afrocentric worldview emphasizes the im- portance of culture and traditions, while feminist theory has the potential to move beyond patriarchal ideology through the negotiation of differences, addressing the ef- fects of privilege and identifying the power and politics of any research process (Ramazanoglu & Holland, 2002).

The snowball technique was used to recruit a purposive sample of 18 African American women from three gen- erations who were mostly middle-class, partnered, and educated in order to explore shared patterns and com-

Table. Demographics

Generation Age Marital Years of

(years of age today) (years)a statusb education achieved

Generation 1 1950–1970

Trudy (83) 20 Married 12

Leigh (80) 19 Married 12

Lena (79) 31 Married 12

Yvonne (77) 20 Married 18

Betty (72) 18 Single 18

Pie (70) 21 Married 16

Traci (65) 20 Single 12

Generation 2 1971–1990

Maria (58) 22 Married 18

Lily (58) 20 Single 12

Geno (57) 23 Married 12

Fatima (55) 23 Married 18

Shay (51) 29 Married 18

Generation 3 1991–2003

Louise (41) 31 Married 12

Desiree (40) 29 Married 16

Bessie (39) 27 Married 18

Monique (36) 22 Married 12

Sarah (35) 26 Single 12

Stevi (30) 25 Married 16

aAge at first birth. bMarital status at first birth.

mon meanings within the context of three generations (Table). The seven women from Generation 1 are now between the ages of 65 and 83 years, and all of the women that were married are now widows. The five women of Generation 2 are between the ages of 51 and 58 years, four are married, and one is divorced. Only one woman in this group is retired, and the others work full time. The women in Generation 3 range in age from 30 to 42 years. Their marital status has not changed since the birth of their first child. Two of the women have chosen to leave the workforce to be stay-at-home mothers. The inclusion criteria used to select participants were: women who identified themselves as African American, were be- tween the ages of 20–85, able to speak English, and had given birth to a living child 3 or more years ago. Using open-ended and semistructured questions, the women in this study were asked to describe how they experi- enced the transition to motherhood. Examples of ques- tions used to elicit their experiences were: Tell me the story of how you felt the first time you found out that you were pregnant and would become a mother; What did you expect motherhood to be like? and How was moth- erhood different from your expectations?

Individual interviews were conducted from August 2008 to November 2008, with most interviews occur- ring in the participant’s home or in a public library. Interviews lasted 1 to 2 hr and were audio-taped,

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transcribed verbatim, reviewed, and entered into NVivo 8, a data management and analysis software package (QSR International, 2008). The first three transcripts were analyzed concurrently with research colleagues to evaluate whether or not the research questions and in- terview techniques were effective in soliciting a rich de- scription of the phenomenon. The seven-stage approach to the circular method of analysis, described by Diekel- mann, Allen, and Tanner (1989), was used to identify shared themes and patterns. This method serves to in- crease our understanding of the phenomenon by first reading the interviews to gain a gestalt of the text, fol- lowed by line-by-line analysis of the text to illuminate shared beliefs and common practices. Emerging patterns and themes are refined through the circular process of analysis, where a greater understanding of the data re- sults from the overlapping process of analysis, reflection on the findings, and discussions with the peer review committee and participants. As consensus is reached, a final return to the data ensures that the interpretations are supported by the information in the data. This con- current, circular method of analysis allows for clarifica- tion and validation of analysis and interpretations. Each participant was afforded the opportunity to review and respond to preliminary and final findings. An audit trail, consisting of a reflexive journal and extensive field notes, was established to further ensure rigor (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). The Georgia State University Institutional Review Board (IRB) reviewed and approved this study.

Findings

For the women of this study, the stories of becom- ing a mother began with finding out they were preg- nant, moved on to prenatal care and birth stories, and finally, descriptions of how they internalized the con- cept of motherhood. Through the circular process of analysis, three constitutive patterns and their relational themes emerged from the data. These patterns are not presented in a hierarchal arrangement; rather, they fol- low the course of most of the interviews.

Constitutive Pattern: It Took Me a Minute

The pattern It Took Me a Minute refers to time. This phrase was used in the stories of two participants as they described how it took them time to adjust to their new identity as mothers. As the stories were analyzed, the no- tion of time was often alluded to. Two women described their struggles with infertility, while others revealed that it took them time to accept an unplanned pregnancy. Also included in the stories were the ways in which, over time, the women reconciled their real-life experiences

with their idealized expectations of the maternal role. Within this pattern, the three relational themes identi- fied are Finding Out, Realizing What Mothers Do, and Way Tricked!

Finding out. This theme offers the first glimpse of how themes within the stories of motherhood over- lapped. Several woman described the stress they felt when they found out they were pregnant and how it took them time to feel an attachment to their unborn child. Their stories described how the support of their mothers, sisters, or husbands allowed them to finish their educa- tion. Pie, from Generation 1, described her reaction to finding out she was pregnant:

I was in college and hadn’t planned to get pregnant right away, so it was a shock! After we accepted the fact that we were going to have a baby, of course it was exciting . . .. After she was born, my sister came and kept her so I could finish school. Finding Out also includes stories describing how the

women tried to prepare for labor and birth once they found out they were pregnant. Stories, particularly from women in Generations 2 and 3, described being unpre- pared for childbirth despite reading pregnancy books and taking childbirth education classes. Bessie, from Genera- tion 3, prepared for childbirth but remembered her first birth as traumatic: “My son was a pretty traumatic birth . . .. I really had no clue, prenatal classes really did not prepare me for the reality of birth. It doesn’t prepare you for reality!” As these women transitioned to the maternal role, they found their expectations of child- birth and motherhood were often quite different from reality.

Realizing what mothers do. As the women de- scribed their transition to motherhood, their descriptions ranged from being unprepared for birth to their surprise at the decisions they would have to make with regard to their children. Their stories illustrated how they were caught up in what Heidegger (1962) described as the “everydayness” or the taken-for-granted role of moth- erhood. One participant from Generation 2 talked about how she had to “think about things,” such as education and who her children befriended. As the women began to fully comprehend what the maternal role encompassed, they described being surprised or overwhelmed with the realization that mothering was about more than meeting the physical needs of their children; it also included emo- tional and spiritual needs. One young woman, from Gen- eration 3, said she was “ridiculously overwhelmed” but acknowledged that, as a stay-at-home mom with three young boys, she was “loving the chaos.” Common to all stories was how each woman realized that her role as a mother changed as her children, and in some cases grand- children, matured.

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Way tricked!. This theme expressed disconnect be- tween expectations and real-life experiences of moth- erhood. A mother from Generation 3’s description of the “white picket-fence” provided an example of the ro- manticized notion of motherhood expressed by several women:

I really had a “picket fence” type image of what moth- ering and family was. I’d have a white picket fence, a nice husband, and everything would be all la-la-la. . .. It’s nothing like that! I was way tricked! It is really hard to be a mom. Mothers from Generations 2 and 3 described how their

expectations of motherhood were influenced by the pop- ular, romantic ideology of motherhood, and when they realized that the ideology was a myth, they were left with feelings of anger. A participant from Generation 2 asked, “Where is the reward?” There were admissions that motherhood was hard, several felt unappreciated, and others admitted to losing their identities.

Constitutive Pattern: Preserving Our Home

The four themes that emerged in the constitutive pattern of Preserving Our Home are Mothering Within the -isms: Racism, Classism, Sexism, I Did the Best I Could, Mothers and Others, and Spiritual Mothering. These themes described the ways in which these women cherished, pro- tected, cared for, and preserved their culture and their families, which include blood and fictive kin (Young, 2001).

Mothering Within the -isms: Racism, Classism, Sexism. Home, as described by the women in Gener- ation 1, was in a segregated community where strong, women-centered networks shared child-care responsibil- ities. Five women from Generation 1 described how diffi- cult it was for African American men to find good-paying jobs and how their husbands had to work two and three jobs in order to provide for their families. Leigh, a Gener- ation 1 mother of six, described the early years this way: “Me and my husband never had a dime from nowhere raising our children. He worked hard, he worked day and night, drove taxi cabs at night and worked in the daytime, but we never asked for nothing.”

As young mothers, the women of Generation 1 de- scribed themselves as poor, yet despite their poverty their husbands wanted them to stay home with their children. Several women shared that, for a while, they did stay at home with their children, but in order to help sus- tain their families, they sought employment as domestic workers for White families. Stories told by these women described how they combined the ideals and mannerisms of their White employers with the customs and habits

they were taught by their own mothers and grandmoth- ers. Yvonne, from Generation 1, shared this memory:

She [her mother] worked in White people’s houses . . . she learned a lot from them and they learned a lot from her. I began to bring all of the customs and habits together that I had been taught by my mother, my mother-in-law, and my grandmother. A recurring theme embedded in the narratives from

all three generations was that limited education and em- ployment options, racial profiling, and escalating black- on-black violence among African American males was a source of fear and anxiety felt by these African Ameri- can mothers for their sons. Lily, Generation 2, described her struggles to not be an overbearing mother but felt that her sons (and nephews) did not have a true under- standing of the dangers and traps they could fall into. She said:

It’s even harder sometimes, to bring up Black American boys. It’s been hard because we live in a terrible, terrible world and you try to help them to not fall into these traps . . . they don’t understand the dangers out there . . . they don’t know. Stories of the mother-daughter relationship reveal that

the ways in which African American mothers socialize their daughters is different from the ways in which they socialize their sons. Fatima, from Generation 2, described herself as a “Sixties child, so love, peace, and every- thing was pretty much taught in our home . . . self pride, high self esteem.” She described her mother as an activist in the Civil Rights Movement. Fatima felt her mother was progressive and remembers learning that “You’re a Black woman first and foremost so you’re going to have to learn harder to get what White women already have.”

Important to each mother was that their daughters be self-reliant, independent, and self-assured. Although there was value placed on men as husbands and fathers, the women in this study understood that the viability of their family might rest on them due to social restric- tions African American men often face. Each generation of women disclosed survival strategies, such as a strong belief in God, education, respect for self and others, and a strong extended family that they used to teach their children how to survive in a society that devalues their existence.

I did the best I could. As the stories of motherhood continued to unfold, the women reminisced about rais- ing their children. Their stories told of how they saw their maternal role as it related to their children, their grand- children, community children, and, for some, in their re- lationship with their own mothers. Most of the partici- pants talked about the importance of religion, education, and teaching their children to respect others.

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Trudy, from Generation 1, said that “Parenting doesn’t come with a guidebook.” She relied on prayer and her faith in God to help her raise her children. She described her children as obedient and said they learned to be re- sponsible doing chores around the house. Trudy taught her children to honor the elderly, be respectful, and be polite. Leigh, also from Generation 1, reminisced about living in a government project where there were all kinds of children, both good and bad. She felt she had to watch her children to be sure they did not fall in with the wrong group of children. She said, “The Lord has been so good to us. I’m just proud of them being able to finish school and get good jobs. None of them ever had to ask for help in the Welfare or nothing like that.” Stevi, from Genera- tion 3, gave the best description of the overarching theme expressed by these women when she said, “Life is chaotic!” Although each woman struggled to do the best she could, they have enjoyed—even loved—the chaos of their lives.

Mothers and others. A common thread in the sto- ries of each generation was the support they received from their community of women. Lily, from Genera- tion 2, gave a positive description of growing up in the projects:

In addition to my mother there were women in the community who all had six or more [children], they were all beautiful women who worked hard. In each family, there was a father and mother. . .. So I had those older girls and their mothers as influences, everybody was very respectful. Stories from each generation of women described ways

in which they offer support through community net- works such as churches and schools. Community re- mained important in the stories of Generations 2 and 3, but unlike Generation 1, where community was the neighborhood, the definition of community moved to schools and churches. Two Generation 2 mothers, both educators, gave examples of the ways they reach out to students and young families. One of these educators said her college motto was “Enter to learn, depart to serve,” and said her favorite quote is “Each one, teach one.”

Spiritual mothers. Having faith in God and instill- ing Christian values in their children was an intertwin- ing theme among the stories told by each generation of women in this study. Although religious preference was not included in the demographic information, the beliefs expressed were consistent with that of Protestant Chris- tians. The storytellers described how they drew upon their faith and trust in God to help them and their families in practical ways. Spirituality was the cornerstone of their daily lives. One Generation 2 mother, who is very ac- tive in her church, described herself as a spiritual mother. She felt that as an elder mother in church, she has both

the obligation and the opportunity to influence younger mothers and their families. For many of these women, faith and church affiliation were sources of their strength and renewal.

Constitutive Pattern: Eat the Meat, Throw Away the Bone

Mass media has an important role in defining and per- petuating society’s beliefs and feelings. Explicit represen- tations of the ideal mother, in mass media outlets and in professional media outlets, construct a specific portrait of reality, and through repeated exposure we adopt this reality as valid (Gerbner, Gross, Morgan, Signorielli, & Shanahan, 2002). The Ways in Which We Learn and Some- one Who Looks Like Me are the two themes of this pattern and describe the impact the media had on these African American women.

The ways in which we learn. As the women of Generation 1 told their stories of motherhood, some al- luded to the wit and wisdom passed down from their mothers and grandmothers regarding pregnancy and par- enting, while others described receiving no information. Leigh, from Generation 1, remembered her first child- birth experience.

I didn’t have sex until I was married and it [childbirth] was kind of scary for me. The midwife came and ex- amined me and told me what to do . . . I was pure wild. I didn’t know nothing about childbirth or nothing! In contrast to the older women of this study, women

in Generations 2 and 3 described a greater reliance on books, magazines, and their healthcare providers. Stevi, from Generation 3, garnered information about mother- hood from books and magazines but also listened to other women’s stories.

You have to do some reading and weed out what you like from what you don’t like, then figure out what’s going to work best for you. I took from it what I needed and what I didn’t . . . just kind of dis- carded . . . I just shaped my own crazy way of doing things. Someone who looks like me. In the past 2 decades

there has been an increase in the media’s fixation with motherhood (Douglas & Michaels, 2000). In many of the stories, the women described depictions of African American mothers as extreme, either as extremely rich or extremely poor. The best description of media representa- tion was from Fatima, the self-described child of the six- ties where “Love, peace, and everything was pretty much taught in our home.”

I don’t think that the average everyday mother is portrayed. It’s the celebrity mom . . . if you’re not that mom, if you’re just some everyday momma, you’re not

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portrayed at all. You’re either portrayed as that mother that’s falling down in the damn street or you’re the mother that is so high up on the hog, you’re not real . . .. But the mother that just gets out there and does her best, . . . the day-to-day people that you don’t even pay attention to walking down the street, where is she in there? Stevi, from Generation 3, agreed that the underrepre-

sentation of African American women in the media is a part of “everyday life.” She too felt that nowhere in the media was there a mother that looked like her. In her comments, she said, “I don’t really see a big por- trayal of working parents who look like me in movies or TV.” Although Desiree, from Generation 3, did not see herself represented in television, she did see what was possible. “I remember the Cosby Show, a lot of African American people said “that show’s so fake.” To me it was real, that’s what I want to be. That was my goal.

Across the generations, the women described ways of learning that universally encompassed the value of oral histories in keeping alive the core values that sustained their families. There was a general feeling that a signif- icant challenge to today’s mothers is the influence that television, the Internet, and more graphic movies have on their children.

When discussing other media outlets for information about motherhood, it was the younger women who re- lied on advice from experts found in books, magazines, and the healthcare system. Because they did not see im- ages that represented them, they described how they self- monitor the information they receive by taking what they feel applies to them and ignoring the rest; in the words of Gloria, a peer reviewer, they eat the meat and throw away the bone.

Discussion

This study describes the concept of motherhood as un- derstood by 18 African American women who reside in a metropolitan southeastern city. Although the stories are presented as discreet themes, the reality is that many of the themes are interwoven across generations. The pat- tern It Took Me a Minute and its relational themes echo concepts that have appeared in the literature on mater- nal identity and becoming a mother (Mercer, 1986, 2010; Rubin, 1984). Strategies the women in this study de- scribed for seeking safe passage, a task of maternal iden- tity, was the use of books, childbirth education, physi- cian advice, and, in Generation 1, the reliance on advice from other women in the family. Their stories corroborate that the developmental task of binding-in or attaching to

their unborn child did not happen immediately but was a process that occurred over time. As the women talked about becoming a mother, giving of oneself was reflected in nurturing behaviors such as instilling values, customs, and habits they had been taught by their mothers, grand- mothers, and “othermothers.” Their stories underscore the Afrocentric view that children are highly prized, and strong value is placed on women’s roles as childbearer and child rearer (Collins, 1991; Greene, 1990). The mul- tiple mothering roles identified by participants, such as grandmother, spiritual mother, and othermother, sup- port Mercer’s (2010) theory of becoming a mother, which more adequately describes the ways in which mother- ing changes as a woman and her children grow and mature.