We recently had our research published in Gender & Society, and we wanted to thank all of you who gave your time to shape the direction of this research early on. We hope that further down you will help us shape the next phase too.. keep reading.
Pezaro, S., Crowther, R., Pearce, G., Jowett, A., Godfrey-Isaacs, L., Samuels, I., & Valentine, V. (2023). Perinatal Care for Trans and Nonbinary People Birthing in Heteronormative “Maternity” Services: Experiences and Educational Needs of Professionals. Gender & Society, 37(1), 124–151. https://doi.org/10.1177/08912432221138086
In line with the majority of contemporary Britons (Tryl et al. 2022), participants were highly trans and nonbinary positive. Participants were most confident in formulating care plans and least confident about the provision of colleagues’ perinatal care in this context. While the majority of participants were positive toward the trans and nonbinary communities, they considered that those communities remain marginalized in perinatal services. Transphobic, anti-trans, and nonbinary attitudes were highlighted by our respondents. Our findings suggest that caregivers witnessed transphobia among colleagues and were apprehensive themselves about providing care to childbearing trans and nonbinary people. They reported a cisheteronormative model of care that lacked awareness of trans and nonbinary issues. The educational needs identified included information about the practicalities of childbearing as a trans or nonbinary person, how to use inclusive language effectively, and creating policies and processes for supporting childbearing trans and nonbinary people. These caregivers’ preferences included hearing from trans and nonbinary people and sharing best practices among themselves, with open discussions about how to be inclusive.
Cisnormative, heteronormative, cisgender, and heteropatriarchal services, administrative procedures, structural forces, and interpersonal treatment combine in the perinatal space. In this study, we provide evidence that such institutionalized “support” is designed to reinforce a gendered experience of pregnancy and childbirth that marginalizes childbearing trans and nonbinary people who do not conform to cisgender ideals. This study also offers important insights as to how providers’ stances inform mundane cisgenderism, passive eugenics, stigma visibility, the minority stress model, and the “doing” and “undoing” of gender.
Health care providers may usefully reflect on whether their service provision could be more identity affirming for the trans and nonbinary communities they serve. Professional trans and nonbinary competent education is needed, and reproductive health services and systems must be more inclusive of trans bodies and identities. Thus, future professionals, systems, and services must be prepared for a new and more inclusive (rather than exclusive) reality.
Despite these findings, we see some initiatives being blocked. As such, we recently wrote an article in ‘The Conversation’ explaining why ‘Building more inclusive pregnancy services for trans and non-binary people isn’t about a culture war‘. We are also planning further research in this area and would love your input on shaping this.
Considering the findings presented above, please take a few moments to respond to our survey below… We would love to hear what you think!
Midwifery and ‘Maternity’ care has been theorised from feminist perspectives, as ‘woman centred’ care, focusing on women’s choice and autonomy in relation to how and where they give birth. Yet trans men and non-binary people are a growing population within ‘maternity’ services experiencing pregnancy, and birth. This poses challenges for midwives, as the retention of professional identity is considered to be the cornerstone of professionalism in healthcare.
Findings from our preliminary work in this area indicate that the strong identification of midwifery as a women’s profession being ‘with women’ also appeared in some cases to be a barrier to the inclusivity of service users who do not identify as women, leading to a range of adverse outcomes (e.g., service users forced to choose between embracing their core human rights to gender identity, and their sexual and reproductive health). Thus we have recently advertised a PhD studentship. The aims of which will be to:
- Explore relationships between the midwifery profession and gender identity
- Critically examine midwives’ everyday rhetorical discourse in relation to midwifing childbearing trans men and non-binary people
- Develop an in depth understanding of midwives’ professional identity in the context of midwifing those who do not identify as women.
If you are interested in applying, please get in touch…
Until next time…Look after yourselves and each other
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Dr Sally Pezaro 