[Maternal experiences at the intensive care unit: a phenomenological experience]

This is a phenomenological research in Martin Heidegger's perspective with eight mothers staying with their babies in the hospital, with the aim of understanding their maternal feelings at the ICU of the Albert Sabin Infant Hospital in Fortaleza-CE. The information was obtained by means of phenomenological interviews with the following probing question, "What is it like for you as a mother to be in an ICU and at the same time follow all that goes on in the hospital unit?" and submitted to the analysis of the phenomena sited as proposed by Martins and Bicudo. The experiences of the mothers revealed safety and feer, hope and anguish, potentialities and impotence, existential concerns and expectations of a human being in the world. Beyond these aspects, the mothers showed themselves to be authentic people that got free of the occupation and deal with the pre-occupation.