First-time postpartum motherhood during armed conflict: experiences, challenges, coping, and support needs among...

Armed conflict creates profound challenges for first-time mothers navigating the early postpartum period without the presence of their partners. The abrupt loss of expected support, combined with heightened fear and prolonged uncertainty, intensifies emotional vulnerability and disrupts maternal adjustment to early parenthood. Despite extensive research on trauma and crisis, little is known about how large-scale armed conflict shapes first-time mothers' lived postpartum experiences and their engagement with care systems. This study aimed to explore these experiences among women who gave birth during an armed conflict while coping alone with infant care due to their partners' military deployment. Twenty first-time mothers participated in this qualitative study, which included in-depth, semi-structured interviews. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis and interpreted through Lazarus and Folkman's Transactional Model of Stress and Coping, following COREQ guidelines. Four themes emerged: (1) Forced single parenthood, (2) The complex role of first-time motherhood in war, (3) Fears and anxieties, and (4) Coping strategies and resources. Participants described emotional exhaustion, fear, loneliness, disrupted bonding, and heightened alertness. A recurrent finding was the clear gap between mothers' expectations for compassionate, continuous postpartum support and the task-oriented, limited emotional care they received from professionals. Mothers relied on internal resilience, family support, community assistance, and breastfeeding as coping mechanisms. These findings demonstrate how armed conflict intensifies maternal vulnerability and reshapes postpartum experiences, underscoring the need for trauma-informed, relational postpartum care and stronger continuity between community and hospital services for mothers navigating early parenthood in conflict settings.