The generative function of a Healthcare system: linking meanings between chronic illness and motherhood

This paper explores the meanings that the experience of chronic physical illness assumes in relation to a specific aspect of the generative function, namely the experience of pregnancy and motherhood. Chronic illness and filiation are both seen as natural phenomena, but they are also products that modify our framework of meaning depending on the context; “critical events” that require a restructuring of identity on the part of the individual and of those institutional figures who represent the healthcare and social system. It describes a research project, in a hospital environment, involving psychological support for women diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis who were preparing for motherhood. What emerges is that the psychological function can aid integration of seemingly incompatible meanings, namely those of chronic illness and the looking ahead and planning that are characteristic of motherhood. Thus the idea of health is synonymous with the kind of decision-making power that psychological support can give to people in a hospital setting.