Fathers’ Lived-Experience of Childbirth: A Descriptive Phenomenological Psychological Inquiry

Abstract

Better understanding fathers’ psychological experience of birth is essential to encouraging empathetic care. Using Giorgi’s 5-step descriptive phenomenological psychological method for analysis, the general psychological structure of what it is like for fathers to experience being involved in the birth of their first-born biological child was uncovered. Five fathers’ descriptions of the phenomenon, collected via nonstructured phenomenological interviews conducted over several months, were analyzed rigorously through descriptive phenomenological psychological reduction and free imaginative variation. The stable general psychological structure consisted of the following constituents: (1) Concern for Wife’s Wellbeing, (2) Empathy and Pride for Wife, (3) Relief in the Successful Birth, (4) Emergence of Interconnectedness with His Newborn Baby, (5) Paternal Responsibility, and (6) Creation of His New Family Constellation. This study highlights a need to understand fathers’ birth experiences as an embodied existential lived experience. This study should be understood in the context of pregnancies of nuclear family heterosexual couples.