A new normal?: Women's experiences of biographical disruption and liminality following treatment for early stage breast cancer

Trusson, Diane; Pilnick, Alison; Roy, Srila

Abstract

Increasing numbers of women are surviving breast cancer, but little is known about the long-term implications of having survived a life-threatening illness and living with embodied reminders of its potential to return. Twenty-four women aged between 42 and 80 (median 1/4 51)who had been treated for early stage breast cancer in the UK between 6 months and 29 years previously, were recruited through local media and interviewed. Analysis of their narratives revealed challenges in the post-treatment period that were conceptualised as biographical disruption and liminality. Although no longer ill, an ongoing fear of recurrence combined with embodied changes prevented a return to ‘normal’ i.e. a pre-cancer state in terms of health status, identity and relationships. We argue that following the biographical disruption of breast cancer, a ‘new normal’ entails a continual renegotiation of identities, daily lives and futures as time passes and lives evolve.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jan 8, 2016
• Online Publication Date: Jan 12, 2016
• Publication Date: 2016-02
• Deposit Date: Apr 25, 2016
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 25, 2016
• Journal: Social Science & Medicine
• Print ISSN: 0277-9536
• Electronic ISSN: 0277-9536
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 151
• Pages: 121-129
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2016.01.011
• Keywords: UK; Breast cancer; Biographical disruption; Liminality; Post-treatment; ‘New normal’
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/978710
• Publisher URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953616300119