Kurdish pregnant women's feelings: a qualitative study.

Objective: to gain a deeper understanding of how Kurdish pregnant women feel about their pregnancy.

Design: a qualitative study analysed by a grounded theory approach.

Setting: the study was conducted among women in the third trimester of their pregnancy in either their homes or the health-care centres in Sanandaj in the western part of Iran.

Participants: 22 pregnant women were recruited and interviewed.

Findings: during pregnancy, women experienced a variety of feelings: 'satisfied and happy', 'unpleasant' and 'ambivalent'.

Conclusions And Implications For Practice: it is important for midwives to ask pregnant women about their feelings concerning their current pregnancy, childbirth and future motherhood. If they express negative or ambivalent feelings, these should be discussed in greater detail and their causes identified. Special consideration should be given to primiparous women and multiparous women with negative experiences of previous pregnancies.