Lesley Wilkes
Biographic Data
| ID | 317426 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Lesley Wilkes |
| GIVEN NAMES | Lesley |
| FAMILY NAME | Wilkes |
| SIGNATURE | WILKES L |
| AFFILIATIONS | Western Sydney University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2986-4510 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 13 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 43 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 13 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
“You take the private part of her body, … you are taking a part of her life”
Western countries working toward eradication of female genital mutilation require better inclusion of women originally from countries where the practice is prevalent. However, few authors have examined the knowledge, attitudes, and experiences of circumcised African migrant women in western countries. Our findings from 40 responses from self-reported survey and five in-depth interviews show that the participating African migrant women know the re…
Adult children of parents with mental illness
Parenting anxiety may be a common experience shared by all parents. However, adult children's worries in relation to their child/ren developing mental illness may be associated with their own experiences of childhood parental mental illness. All health professionals have a pinnacle role in supporting families to build resilience and harness positive experiences within familial relationships to recognise and mitigate parenting anxiety
De novoFamilies
The aim of this recent Australian study was to explore the experiences of lesbian women choosing motherhood. Participants included 30 self-identifying lesbian mothers. Data were collected via interviews, data collection sheets, and online journaling. The interview and journaling data were analyzed using constant comparative analysis and subsequently illuminated three main themes: becoming mothers, constructing motherhood, and legitimizing our fam…
Lesbian Women Choosing Motherhood
Increasingly, lesbian women are choosing to have children in the context of a same-sex relationship, and their journey to conception and on to motherhood involves a range of decisions that are unique to lesbian couples. While creating a de novo family is burdened with decisions, choosing to be parents was a deliberate and conscious decision made by lesbian women participating in our study. The findings presented in this article focus on choosing …
Adult children of parents with mental illness
The experiences of children who live with parental mental illness are becoming increasingly recognized. However, there remains a limited body of knowledge in relation to an individual's longer term experiences. This study sought adult children's experiences of childhood parental mental illness. It generated reflections of 13 adult children who had lived with parents with mental illness during their childhood. The narrative design of the study fac…
De Novo Lesbian Families
This study aimed to explore the experiences of other mothers in de novo or planned lesbian-led families in Australia to elaborate on one theme: legitimizing our families. Little is known or understood about how lesbians construct mothering within their families. Even less is understood about the experiences of the often marginalized and invisible other mother; that is, the non-birth mother in lesbian families. Fifteen self-identified lesbian coup…
Perceptions of Long-Term Female Foster-Carers
The need for foster-carers has significantly increased in recent decades as growing numbers of children are in need of out-of-home care. However, despite their importance to the foster-care system, the foster-carer role is imbued with ambiguity. The perceptions and expectations of the foster-carer role differ greatly between child protection workers, the children in foster-care, the wider community and foster-carers themselves. This paper seeks t…
Beginning Again
Settling in a new country exposes immigrants to various health risk factors, and the existing literature alludes to immigrant women being more vulnerable than men. This article highlights some of the difficulties faced by West African women while settling into life in Australia. A qualitative design was used to explore the experiences of West African immigrant women living in Sydney, Australia. Data were collected using audiotaped face-to-face in…
Interviewing people about potentially sensitive topics
AIM: This paper explores the challenges of interviewing people about sensitive topics. It uses existing literature and the first author's experience of interviewing women traumatised by having an emergency hysterectomy following a severe postpartum haemorrhage. It also highlights the strategies that can assist interviews. BACKGROUND: Interviewing participants about sensitive topics requires skill and special techniques. Certain research topics ha…
Women’s perceptions and experiences of a traumatic birth
AIM: This study presents the findings a meta-ethnographic study reporting women's perceptions and experiences of traumatic birth. BACKGROUND: Childbirth is viewed by many as a life transition that can bring a sense of accomplishment. However, for some women, birth is experienced as a traumatic event with a minority experiencing post-traumatic stress. A traumatic birth experience can have a significant impact on the physical and emotional well-bei…
Bullying as Circuits of Power
It is not possible to understand bullying without considering the concept of power, and yet power has received little systematic attention in the literature on bullying. Framed largely as a manifestation of conflict, or as a consequence of organizational characteristics that trigger unwitting individuals to engage in abusive acts, superficial and clichéd understandings of the power dynamics involved in bullying are commonplace. The focus on confl…
Living in the red zone
Child‐to‐mother violence is an area of family violence that has received limited attention over the past 20 years but is a problem for many families. It is poorly understood in the community and this lack of understanding creates a basis for families and service providers to minimize the abused mothers' experience. This paper is drawn from a larger study that aimed to explore child‐to‐mother violence in a high‐risk geographical area and describes…
Friendships under strain
Middle managers in today's organisations have reported experiencing longer working hours and intensified work regimes. These increased pressures, in turn, have led to growing difficulty in addressing the integration of their work and personal lives. In an exploratory study of the daily workplace experiences of Australian middle managers and the impacts on their personal lives, one of the key themes to emerge was respondents' concerns about the ne…
De novoFamilies
The aim of this recent Australian study was to explore the experiences of lesbian women choosing motherhood. Participants included 30 self-identifying lesbian mothers. Data were collected via interviews, data collection sheets, and online journaling. The interview and journaling data were analyzed using constant comparative analysis and subsequently illuminated three main themes: becoming mothers, constructing motherhood, and legitimizing our fam…
Perceptions of Long-Term Female Foster-Carers
The need for foster-carers has significantly increased in recent decades as growing numbers of children are in need of out-of-home care. However, despite their importance to the foster-care system, the foster-carer role is imbued with ambiguity. The perceptions and expectations of the foster-carer role differ greatly between child protection workers, the children in foster-care, the wider community and foster-carers themselves. This paper seeks t…
Living in the red zone
Child‐to‐mother violence is an area of family violence that has received limited attention over the past 20 years but is a problem for many families. It is poorly understood in the community and this lack of understanding creates a basis for families and service providers to minimize the abused mothers' experience. This paper is drawn from a larger study that aimed to explore child‐to‐mother violence in a high‐risk geographical area and describes…
Bullying as Circuits of Power
It is not possible to understand bullying without considering the concept of power, and yet power has received little systematic attention in the literature on bullying. Framed largely as a manifestation of conflict, or as a consequence of organizational characteristics that trigger unwitting individuals to engage in abusive acts, superficial and clichéd understandings of the power dynamics involved in bullying are commonplace. The focus on confl…
Friendships under strain
Middle managers in today's organisations have reported experiencing longer working hours and intensified work regimes. These increased pressures, in turn, have led to growing difficulty in addressing the integration of their work and personal lives. In an exploratory study of the daily workplace experiences of Australian middle managers and the impacts on their personal lives, one of the key themes to emerge was respondents' concerns about the ne…
Adult children of parents with mental illness
The experiences of children who live with parental mental illness are becoming increasingly recognized. However, there remains a limited body of knowledge in relation to an individual's longer term experiences. This study sought adult children's experiences of childhood parental mental illness. It generated reflections of 13 adult children who had lived with parents with mental illness during their childhood. The narrative design of the study fac…
Living in the red zone
Child‐to‐mother violence is an area of family violence that has received limited attention over the past 20 years but is a problem for many families. It is poorly understood in the community and this lack of understanding creates a basis for families and service providers to minimize the abused mothers' experience. This paper is drawn from a larger study that aimed to explore child‐to‐mother violence in a high‐risk geographical area and describes…
Friendships under strain
Middle managers in today's organisations have reported experiencing longer working hours and intensified work regimes. These increased pressures, in turn, have led to growing difficulty in addressing the integration of their work and personal lives. In an exploratory study of the daily workplace experiences of Australian middle managers and the impacts on their personal lives, one of the key themes to emerge was respondents' concerns about the ne…
Women’s perceptions and experiences of a traumatic birth
AIM: This study presents the findings a meta-ethnographic study reporting women's perceptions and experiences of traumatic birth. BACKGROUND: Childbirth is viewed by many as a life transition that can bring a sense of accomplishment. However, for some women, birth is experienced as a traumatic event with a minority experiencing post-traumatic stress. A traumatic birth experience can have a significant impact on the physical and emotional well-bei…
Bullying as Circuits of Power
It is not possible to understand bullying without considering the concept of power, and yet power has received little systematic attention in the literature on bullying. Framed largely as a manifestation of conflict, or as a consequence of organizational characteristics that trigger unwitting individuals to engage in abusive acts, superficial and clichéd understandings of the power dynamics involved in bullying are commonplace. The focus on confl…
Interviewing people about potentially sensitive topics
AIM: This paper explores the challenges of interviewing people about sensitive topics. It uses existing literature and the first author's experience of interviewing women traumatised by having an emergency hysterectomy following a severe postpartum haemorrhage. It also highlights the strategies that can assist interviews. BACKGROUND: Interviewing participants about sensitive topics requires skill and special techniques. Certain research topics ha…
Beginning Again
Settling in a new country exposes immigrants to various health risk factors, and the existing literature alludes to immigrant women being more vulnerable than men. This article highlights some of the difficulties faced by West African women while settling into life in Australia. A qualitative design was used to explore the experiences of West African immigrant women living in Sydney, Australia. Data were collected using audiotaped face-to-face in…
De Novo Lesbian Families
This study aimed to explore the experiences of other mothers in de novo or planned lesbian-led families in Australia to elaborate on one theme: legitimizing our families. Little is known or understood about how lesbians construct mothering within their families. Even less is understood about the experiences of the often marginalized and invisible other mother; that is, the non-birth mother in lesbian families. Fifteen self-identified lesbian coup…
Perceptions of Long-Term Female Foster-Carers
The need for foster-carers has significantly increased in recent decades as growing numbers of children are in need of out-of-home care. However, despite their importance to the foster-care system, the foster-carer role is imbued with ambiguity. The perceptions and expectations of the foster-carer role differ greatly between child protection workers, the children in foster-care, the wider community and foster-carers themselves. This paper seeks t…
Lesbian Women Choosing Motherhood
Increasingly, lesbian women are choosing to have children in the context of a same-sex relationship, and their journey to conception and on to motherhood involves a range of decisions that are unique to lesbian couples. While creating a de novo family is burdened with decisions, choosing to be parents was a deliberate and conscious decision made by lesbian women participating in our study. The findings presented in this article focus on choosing …
Adult children of parents with mental illness
The experiences of children who live with parental mental illness are becoming increasingly recognized. However, there remains a limited body of knowledge in relation to an individual's longer term experiences. This study sought adult children's experiences of childhood parental mental illness. It generated reflections of 13 adult children who had lived with parents with mental illness during their childhood. The narrative design of the study fac…
De novoFamilies
The aim of this recent Australian study was to explore the experiences of lesbian women choosing motherhood. Participants included 30 self-identifying lesbian mothers. Data were collected via interviews, data collection sheets, and online journaling. The interview and journaling data were analyzed using constant comparative analysis and subsequently illuminated three main themes: becoming mothers, constructing motherhood, and legitimizing our fam…
“You take the private part of her body, … you are taking a part of her life”
Western countries working toward eradication of female genital mutilation require better inclusion of women originally from countries where the practice is prevalent. However, few authors have examined the knowledge, attitudes, and experiences of circumcised African migrant women in western countries. Our findings from 40 responses from self-reported survey and five in-depth interviews show that the participating African migrant women know the re…
Adult children of parents with mental illness
Parenting anxiety may be a common experience shared by all parents. However, adult children's worries in relation to their child/ren developing mental illness may be associated with their own experiences of childhood parental mental illness. All health professionals have a pinnacle role in supporting families to build resilience and harness positive experiences within familial relationships to recognise and mitigate parenting anxiety
Psychology (12 works) · Social Psychology (7 works) · Sociology (7 works) · Developmental psychology (6 works) · Medicine (6 works) · Political science (5 works) · Social Psychology (5 works) · Gender Studies (4 works) · Narrative (4 works) · Lesbian (3 works)