Browsing by Subject "Intimate relationships"

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    A qualitative exploration of stakeholders' perspectives on the experiences, challenges, and needs of persons with serious mental illness as they consider finding a partner or becoming parent
    (Frontiers Media, 2023-01-11) Dubreucq, Marine; Lysaker, Paul H.; Dubreucq, Julien; Psychiatry, School of Medicine
    Background: While many persons with serious mental illness (SMI) consider intimate relationships and becoming parent as central parts of their lives deeply affecting wellbeing and recovery, others anticipate facing multiple challenges in these life domains. This qualitative study sought to explore the perspectives of persons with SMI and mental health providers (MHPs) with diverse backgrounds and practices on the experiences, challenges, needs and expectations of persons with SMI as they consider finding a partner or becoming parent. Methods: For this qualitative study, we conducted five focus groups between March and December 2020 for a total number of 22 participants (nine persons with SMI and thirteen MHPs) recruited from a center for psychiatric rehabilitation and a community mental health center in France. We used the inductive six-step process by Braun and Clarke for the thematic analysis. Results: Participants reported some challenges related to intimate relationships, stigma/self-stigma, disclosure and decision-making about start a family. Their expectations included: (i) psychoeducation about decision-making about finding a partner and starting a family; (ii) support in making empowered decisions about finding a partner, starting a family or disclosure to a prospective partner or their child; (iii) peer-support interventions; (iv) enhancing coping strategies; (v) integrated service provision including home treatment interventions, training to recovery-oriented practices and access to dedicated resources for providers. Conclusion: In short, intimate relationships and desire to start a family for persons with SMI should be more considered in psychiatric rehabilitation and additional support and interventions should therefore be provided.
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    Relationship and sexual satisfaction are associated with better disease self-management in persons with epilepsy
    (Elsevier, 2021) Gesselman, Amanda N.; Wion, Rachel K.; Garcia, Justin R.; Miller, Wendy R.; School of Nursing
    Prior research has demonstrated that PWEs view intimate interpersonal relationships as personally important and as a substantive challenge in their lives. This is significant as high-quality intimate relationships have been linked with greater well-being and better healthcare self-management in other disease contexts. For persons with epilepsy (PWEs), self-management is critical for seizure control, lower mortality, and better quality of life. In the current study, we conducted the first known investigation into the quality of PWEs' intimate relationships and their self-management abilities. In a sample of 88 PWEs, using the Adult Epilepsy Self-Management Instrument, results demonstrate links between greater relationship satisfaction and sexual satisfaction with better self-management on seven of the eleven subscales: health communication, coping skills, social support, seizure tracking, seizure response, stress management, and wellness; satisfaction was unrelated to the treatment, safety, medical adherence, and proactivity subscales. Importantly, these results held while controlling for age, gender, social support, and presence of comorbidities. These findings provide some evidence of the importance of intimate relationships in understanding PWEs' healthcare management abilities. Given that intimate relationship dynamics have been shown to be highly amenable to intervention, this is an area of potential interest for improving self-management in PWEs.