Centrality of family bonds in the experience of middle-aged women.

Objective: To analyze meanings attributed to middle-aged women from their experience in their family relationships.

Method: Qualitative study of the Convergent Care Research method. Gender was used as an analytical category, developed with a total of thirteen middle-aged women from the coverage area of the Family Health Strategy program in a city in the southwest of Bahia state, through reflection workshops and interviews. Data were analyzed using discourse analysis.

Results: They express the affective relationship with children and grandchildren as the greatest highlight of middle age in overlap with the relationship with partners and other bonds, which makes their uniqueness and identification of demands for health care unfeasible.

Conclusion: Female middle-aged are marked by conceptions of femininity that emerge from their condition as a woman-mother, from her complete donation. The research points to an urgent need to add gender as a reference for the care of middle-aged women, in order to consider the biopsychic and social interlaces in their life experience and that outline demands for care.