Families Expecting and Living with a Baby: a Perspective on Parental Worries

Abstract

The aim is to describe parents’ worries about their family’s life situation during pregnancy and when their children are very young. The aim is to form a better understanding of parental worries for being able to better help them in child and family services. Previous research indicates that parental worries and concerns are not always addressed. Data consisted of parents’ open answers (N = 98) to questionnaires carried out at two time points: during pregnancy and the early childhood of the family’s children. The data were analyzed by inductive content analysis. The results show that families had six different types of worries. The parents described worries concerning health, parental challenges, relationships, sufficiency of resources, standard of living, and difficulties in obtaining support. Challenges related to family life or parenthood could emerge suddenly or develop slowly and cumulate. Either kinds of challenges were often difficult to solve without outside assistance. Identifying and intervening in parental worries sufficiently early is crucial and effective. It is difficult for the professionals who work with families to form a comprehensive perception of children’s and family’s life situation without systematic evaluation and discussions on parental worries.