Health as Expanding Consciousness: Seven Women Living With Multiple Sclerosis or Rheumatoid Arthritis

Abstract

The meaning of health as expanding consciousness is explored through stories of seven women who developed multiple sclerosis or rheumatoid arthritis during their lives. Using Newman’s hermeneutic-dialectic approach, unstructured interviews were conducted over a 2-year period. Analysis and interpretation of narratives concerning person-environment interactions revealed turning points and separate choice points before four new ways of living including finding simple pleasures, being positive, gaining self-control, and self-differentiation, were found. Support for Newman’s stages of expanding consciousness and more comprehensive descriptions of self-transcendence in space and time are presented. Implications for theory development and theory-guided practice are offered.

Keywords

multiple sclerosis Newman’s theory rheumatoid arthritis

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