Caesarean sections on maternal request

Discover the thirteenth session of the seminar “Regards croisés sur la petite enfance” 2024-2025: "Caesarean sections on maternal request".

The seminar looks at early childhood as a social, historical and cultural construct. Theories and knowledge relating to the conception, birth and development of children are analyzed in terms of their interactions with their environment and gender norms. Against this backdrop, the seminar will explore the boundaries of this age category and address the question of its temporality according to medical, international, anthropological or historical standards.

Giving birth is not always a matter of course. For example, some women ask for a caesarean section for no medical reason, without ever having given birth before. This request often perplexes the caregivers who are confronted with it. Through the presentation of her research, Alexandra Bouchard will illustrate the extraordinary richness and complexity of what happens to women during childbirth, as well as the diversity of unconscious requests addressed to the teams. The results shed new light on the reasons behind recourse to caesarean sections without medical indication. More broadly, they show the opportunity for psychic reworking that the intrinsically feminine experience of childbirth represents for all pregnant women.

• Alexandra Bouchard: clinical psychologist, psychoanalyst, doctor of psychology