The thesis tries to describe the changes in the lives of mothers who are on maternity leave and use this time to care for and look after their children. In the theoretical part I place motherhood in the period of adulthood, I describe partnership and the passage to parenthood. I perform a detailed analysis of the period of postmodern motherhood, I deal with social networks and the support provided by others during motherhood. Interpersonal relations, social network, social capital and social exclusion are very important for my thesis. All these topics are further linked to the possibility of postpartum disorders and problems.
The empirical part deals with the research questions of the thesis and contains a qualitative analysis of six group interviews with young mothers giving information on changes in their lives, their partners´ and closer social network’s support, changes in contacts and the meaning of contacts with other mothers. I discover that young mothers enjoy big support of their partners which makes it easier for them to face changes at this time. Social network changes are noticed mostly in the frequency of contacts. The help of those closest to them is very important to young mothers. New contacts appear in their wider social network, mostly other mothers and with whom they connect into groups. Participation in groups represents an very important social network for them. The results, however, cannot be generalised to a wider population because the mothers I interviewed represent homogeneous groups, all have heterosexual partners and they have already had a good social network before giving birth and therefore just continue in making new social contacts.
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