Becoming a mother-athlete: female athletes’ transition to motherhood in Slovenia

Abstract

Perceptions of incompatibility of sport and motherhood still exist within both sport and family Slovene cultures. For many female athletes starting a family means an end of their athletic careers. However, some women decide to pursue their athletic life after they become mothers. While recent media interest in mother-athletes has increased significantly, scientific research focusing on this topic is still scarce. The purpose of this study was to explore the transition of Slovene female athletes into motherhood and their experiences of combining motherhood with competitive sport. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight female elite athletes, who became mothers during their elite level competitive career. The results of the study revealed that mother-athletes perceived this transition as a long-term process in which motherhood and elite sport had a reciprocal effect on each other. Three transition phases characterized by changes in the participants’ holistic development were identified: (1) pre-pregnancy and pregnancy, (2) returning to competitive sport, and (3) living the life of a mother-athlete.

Keywords:

• Women
• sport
• parenthood
• holistic athletic career model

Introduction

Over the past decades, research about athletic career development has substantially increased and its focus has been shifted from singular athletic career transitions (e.g. sport career termination) into a holistic, lifespan, multi-level approach (Stambulova et al. 2009). Greater knowledge about athletes’ career development resulted in several proposed models of athletic career which define the athletic career as a succession of stages, representing a general pattern in the careers of athletes from different types of sport, nationalities, as well as both genders. One of the most comprehensive models describing athletic career development is holistic athletic career model (HAC; Wylleman, Reints, and De Knop 2013). Following the ‘whole-person’ and ‘whole-career’ approach, the model gives a description of characteristics and types of transitions athletes may deal with throughout their athletic career development on different levels of their life, i.e. athletic, psychological, psychosocial, academic/vocational, and financial level.

Becoming a parent is one of the most important transitions occurring in a person’s life. Despite its importance, transition to parenthood is significantly underrepresented in athletic career transition research. According to the HAC model (Wylleman, Reints, and De Knop 2013), in sport, this transition often happens during a stage in an athletes’ competitive career that is strongly connected to changes occurring in the private lives of athletes (Wylleman and Lavallee 2004). While many athletes may decide to pursue their athletic life together with their family obligations and continue with their competitive career, for some athletes, starting a family represents an end to their competitive career (Cecić Erpič 2002; Cecić Erpič, Wylleman, and Zupančič 2004). Unlike for male athletes, the physical process of pregnancy and childbirth will necessarily disrupt a female athlete’s career for a certain period of time. Gender comparison revealed that female athletes more often than males end their athletic career as they decide to become a parent (McGannon et al. 2015; Moesch, Mayer, and Elbe 2012; Reints 2011).

It seems that, especially for women, cultural narratives of incompatibility between having kids and being an elite level athlete are still strong, leading female athletes to see their competitive career as a project deemed to be conducted before parenthood (Appleby and Fisher 2009; Ronkainen, Watkins, and Ryba 2016). The accepted social role of a mother seems to exclude traits typically connected with competitiveness, such as tough-mindedness, dominance, and aggression (Lantz and Schroeder 1999). Carless and Douglas (2012, 2013) argue that single-minded dedication to sport and complete orientation to athletic success are often perceived as the only way of becoming and living the life of an elite athlete. Female athletes are also expected to be completely devoted to sport, resisting other domains in life and placing their relationship below their athletic career (Douglas and Carless 2009). On the other hand, culturally endorsed narratives of motherhood focus mainly on caring and providing for one’s child, being selfless and sacrificing their own needs for those of their child (Carless and Douglas 2009; Douglas and Carless 2009). As these cultural and societal values propose, social expectations for mothers (e.g. being available, prioritizing the needs of the child) are incompatible with the demands of the performance narrative, this perceived incompatibility may lead many female athletes to believe it is impossible to combine an elite athletic career with motherhood.

According to Neiterman (2012), pregnancy can be seen as a transition to motherhood during which women acquire new social roles and face some generally existing social norms surrounding pregnancy, such as e.g. that a pregnant woman should feel responsible for the baby’s welfare and acquire responsible behaviour which is not potentially harmful for the child. In this light, the safety of both mother and the baby has been identified as a key reason for ceasing athletic participation (Palmer and Leberman 2009). However, medical studies about the effects of vigorous exercise during pregnancy (e.g. Kardel and Kase 1998; Penttinen and Erkkola 1997) revealed that such physical activity has no adverse effects on the course of pregnancy, the labour or on the foetus by women who were well trained pre-conceptually. Existing research suggest that well-trained women can benefit substantially from training at high volumes during an uncomplicated pregnancy and that such training can facilitate a successful and quick return to competitive sport after pregnancy (Kardel 2005).

Recent media interest in women pursuing their sport during pregnancy and parenthood, including female athletes’ successful come-backs after childbirth (e.g. Serena Williams, Kim Clijsters, Kerri Walsh, Dara Torres, Paula Radcliffe), has increased significantly (McGannon et al. 2012), portraying it as an emerging social phenomenon (Palmer and Leberman 2009). It should therefore not be surprising that scientific research within the domain of sport psychology focusing specifically on mother-athletes has remained scarce (Leberman and LaVoi 2011). In fact, only limited research has been conducted on mothers working as athletic coaches (e.g. Leberman and Palmer 2009; Leberman and LaVoi 2011), the experiences of elite athletes who returned to competition after having children (e.g. Appleby and Fisher 2009; Palmer and Leberman 2009), and media constructions of elite mother-athletes (e.g. McGannon et al. 2012; McGannon et al. 2015).

Slovene sport culture generally positions motherhood into a woman’s post-athletic life. Currently, there are no incentives of Slovene sports governing bodies in supporting female athletes making their decision to become a mother while still being in elite sport. However, all women in Slovenia are entitled to take up to a year of maternity leave with receiving a maternity pay. Research shows (e.g. Tekavc 2017) that Slovene athletes perceive motherhood as a project which typically follows women’s athletic career termination and believe that combining both roles, i.e. being an athlete and being a mother, is very difficult if not impossible. A study with retired Slovene elite athletes (Tekavc, Wylleman, and Cecić Erpič 2015) showed that majority of athletes in the study became a parent after they terminated their athletic career. However, this was not a case with male team athletes in the study who became a father during their athletic career and therefore combined both roles. Unlike women in the study, they reported receiving a strong support from their spouse and facing no major challenges in leading a life of a father-athlete. Researchers (e.g. Grum, Cebular, and Kobal Grum 2015) report that young families in Slovenia typically show an extended cohabitation with their parents. It is therefore very common that different family generations in Slovenia live together, which means that grandparents are taking a visible role in their children’s transition to parenthood and are actively involved in their grandchildren’s development (Zupančič, Komidar, and Puklek Levpušček 2014).

This study is focused on exploring how elite female athletes perceive their transition into motherhood and how they combine their athletic career with the role of being a mother. Since knowledge about mother-athletes is scarce especially within athletic career transition research, our aim was to achieve a thorough and holistic insight into how pregnancy and motherhood influence different spheres in female athletes’ lives, including their athletic career, individual development, social relationships, academic/vocational investments, and financial state.

Methodology

The study was based on postpositivism, which assumes that there is a real world with verifiable patterns that can be observed and predicted, and that describing reality and determining truth are the important goals of scientific inquiry (Patton 2002). To achieve this, we’ve selected qualitative inquiry using semi-structured interviews which allowed us to explore women’s experiences of becoming a mother athlete. Data analysis was informed by theoretical assumptions of HAC model (Wylleman, Reints, and De Knop 2013).

Participants

Participants were Slovene elite female athletes, who became mothers at the time of their elite athletic career and continued with their competitive sport after giving birth. The elite level description refers to athletes at the world championship level or above.

Recruitment of study participants took place through expert and snowball sampling methods. Representatives of various Slovene sport organizations were contacted in order to secure their support with the recruitment process. The first author invited nine prospective Slovene female athletes by email to take part in a study about combining an elite sport career with motherhood. Eight of them responded positively and signed an informed consent.

The participants represented various types of sport, i.e. badminton, track and field, judo, gymnastics, canoeing, triathlon, and taekwondo. All participants were professional athletes at the time of their pregnancy and all of them returned to elite level sport afterwards. At the time of the interview, their age ranged from 30 to 36 years. All participants were parent to one child (ranging in age from six months to seven years), with eight participants being married or having partners, and one participant being a single mother. Six participants were still pursuing their athletic career at the time of the interview, while two retired within the past two years.

Data collection and analysis

The first author conducted individual semi-structured interviews with the mother-athletes, which included questions regarding their transition into motherhood and their experiences in combining motherhood with an athletic career. For these purposes, a semi-structured interview guide was developed which consisted of primary questions and suggestions for follow-up questions (Patton 2002).

Each interview started with informing participants about the purpose of the study, their right to withdraw at any time during or after the interview, the treatment of the data, ensuring confidentiality and participant anonymity. After that, participants were asked to provide contextual information (i.e. age, type of sport, child’s age, marital status, employment). The main part of the interview contained a range of primary questions, whose wording varied slightly in accordance with the general format of semi-structured interview (Patton 2002). The theme of the questions was as follows: (1) life before pregnancy (Please describe the time you decided to become a mother. What can you say about your athletic, personal, social, occupational, and financial life spheres in the time before your pregnancy?) (2) decision to have a child (Did/How did you plan your pregnancy?) (3) pregnancy time (Please describe the time of your pregnancy. What can you say about your athletic, personal, social, occupational, and financial sphere in the time of your pregnancy?) (4) decision to return to sport after giving birth (Did/How did you plan your return to competitive sport after giving birth?) (5) returning to competitive sport after birth (Please describe your returning process to sport after childbirth.); (6) combining motherhood with an athletic career (How do you combine your involvement in sport with your mother role? What can you say about your current athletic, personal, social, occupational, and financial life spheres?) and (7) social network support (Do you receive any support for combining your athletic career obligations with motherhood?). The interview guide did not represent a rigid set of questions but was refined and developed as the interview progressed (Corbin and Strauss 2008). Additional questions, follow-up questions, probes and prompts were used in order to ensure accurate understanding of the answers, and to clarify or elaborate on specific points.

The interviews lasted between 42 and 68 min, with a total of 464.23 min of interview recorded and a mean duration of 58.45 min. The interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed by the first author. The first and the third author read the interview transcripts several times to ensure familiarization with the data. After that, they independently coded the transcripts into meaning units (i.e. words, sentences or phrases containing one idea) in accordance to the purpose of the study. All meaning units were compared and discussed by both analysts until a consensus was reached. In the next step, these meaning units were categorized deductively into six main categories reflecting the levels of female athletes’ development, which are represented in the HAC model (Reints 2011; Wylleman, Reints, and De Knop 2013): (1) ‘Athletic level’, themes containing female athletes’ athletic engagement and performance; (2) ‘Psychological level’, themes involving female athletes’ psychological status and changes; (3) ‘Psychosocial level’, themes about female athletes’ relationship with significant others (i.e. child, partner, parents, coach); (4) ‘Vocational level’, themes about female athletes’ occupation and employment status; and (5) ‘Financial level’, themes containing information about female athletes’ financial position. As pregnancy and transition into motherhood represent major physical changes for a woman athlete, the ‘Physical level’, including themes representing female athletes’ physical development was also included. Based on the observation that these identified themes change throughout the transition process, we inductively identified three phases in female athletes’ transition to motherhood. Each of these three transition phases holds specific characteristics in all spheres of female athletes’ development.

Findings and discussion

Gathered data allowed the application of developmental levels as predicted by the HAC model (Wylleman, Reints, and De Knop 2013). Altogether, 58 themes were identified, which were categorized into Physical level (13 themes), Athletic level (9 themes), Psychological level (19 themes), Psychosocial level (11 themes), Academic/Vocational level (3 themes), and Financial level (3 themes). We identified three phases in participants’ transition from being an elite athlete into being a mother-athlete and named them as: (1) Pre-pregnancy and pregnancy phase; (2) Returning to competitive sport; (3) Living the life of a mother-athlete.

Pre-pregnancy and pregnancy phase

This first phase of this transition started well ahead of the actual time of childbirth, more specifically with participants’ considerations about creating a family and having a child, and ended with the birth of their child.

At the physical level, participants reported feeling physically ready to become pregnant and to have a child. One of the women reported how suffering a major injury, which temporarily caused her to discontinue her athletic career, brought her to think about using the rehabilitation period to become pregnant. All participants spoke about their experiences of their changing pregnant body: none of them had any medical problems or considerations, they all enjoyed their new body sensations associated with pregnancy. The participants recalled how they started to listen more to themselves and became more focused on their body-sensations (e.g. taking more rests when needed). Three women perceived their pregnancy as a perfect time for recovery; they believed their pregnancy represented an ideal time to rest and heal naturally from the overexertion and injures they had accumulated throughout their athletic career.

At the athletic level, the timing of the decision to have a baby clearly coincided with participants’ career development following the four-year Olympic cycle. Seven out of eight participants stated they planned to get pregnant immediately after the Olympic Games (OGs), which would allow them to return back to competitive sport before the qualifications for the next OGs. For one participant, her decision to have a baby was not clearly connected to the OGs, but still occurred in a period that was less intense in terms of the quantity and intensity of her athletic workload. During pregnancy, participants gradually decreased their amount of athletic participation. This, however, depended on the individual situation of each woman (i.e. her physical status, gynaecologist’s instructions about the amount and intensity of exercise they were allowed to do), and type of her selected sport, with participants performing in contact sports (i.e. judo, taekwondo) discontinuing their training earlier than the others due to safety reasons. Despite individual differences in training load, all participants stayed active during their pregnancy (e.g. doing their normal athletic work in a decreased amount, taking group classes for pregnant women, training younger children). With this regular amount of exercise, they wanted to keep a basic level of physical fitness, which would allow them a quicker and more successful return to sport after childbirth.

At the psychological level, the identity of the participants in the period before childbirth was mainly constructed around their athletic role. According to the reports, they perceived themselves mainly as athletes at that time, and spoke about how much they enjoyed their position of being an elite athlete. At the same time, they recalled feeling a strong wish to have a child and being ready to become a mother. In this phase, all participants were already determined to return to competitive sport after childbirth. Two women recalled having mixed feelings about their decision to become a mother: they experienced positive emotions due to their forthcoming baby, but, at the same time, also had regrets that they withdrew from their athletic role and feelings of uncertainty whether they would succeed in returning to their previous performance level. One of the participants illustrated this with the following quote:

During the first competition, which I attended in a role of spectator instead of an athlete, I went outside and cried after every performance. It just didn’t feel right not to be there anymore.

In general, all participants felt a high sense of psychological well-being during their pregnancy. Since the amount of their athletic work decreased during pregnancy, they reported having more time for themselves and other interests, which they had previously left aside due to their athletic career.

At the psychosocial level, the partner of the female athletes was recognized as the most important source of support at that time. Participants recalled this phase as a time period when they settled down with their partner as a couple and mutually made the decision to start a family and have children. Next, the athletes’ coach and gynaecologist were identified as influential figures, since they both actively participated in constructing the athlete’s lifestyle in terms of exercise and health. Two participants, who remained active in their sport until the very late phase of their pregnancy, reported that they had to deal with external pressures, which were based around general assumptions that vigorous exercise represents a danger for both the pregnant woman and the baby. One of them said:

My partner’s parents were shocked by the fact that I competed up to the fifth month of my pregnancy and travelled overseas to attend competitions. However, after they made sure everything was fine with me and the baby, they calmed down a bit.

At the vocational and financial level, seven out of eight participants obtained the status of a professional athlete before and during their pregnancy, and began their maternity leave when they gave birth. One participant without the status of a professional athlete was still a student when she became pregnant and used the available time in her pregnancy to finish her master’s thesis. The status of professional athlete allowed the participants a monthly payment given by Slovene Government, which financially supports elite athletes in Slovenia. It gave the mother-athletes a certain amount of financial security, and none of them reported having any financial concerns or difficulties in that phase.

Returning to sport phase

Soon after childbirth, mother-athletes began the gradual process of returning to their pre-pregnancy level of athletic performance. This transitional phase began with childbirth and ended approximately one year later.

At the physical level, participants faced a great decline in their physical abilities, i.e. in their physical endurance, strength, and balance due to loosened joints and tendons. One of the participants compared this phase of returning to sport after childbirth to the process of returning to sport after an injury, since childbirth ‘just like an injury forces you to temporarily quit sport and requires a lot of mental strength to return to the previous level’.

Women differed in their perceived level of pain and discomfort after childbirth and during their first attempts of exercise, which ranged from almost no perceived pain to a large amount of physical pain that prevented them from taking part in any form of physical activity. In concordance with this, participants re-started physical exercise after childbirth at differing times. Despite these difficulties at the beginning of the process of training after childbirth, all participants spoke about a fast physical recovery and rapid progress in their athletic performance after childbirth. They recalled having large amounts of energy and experienced a fast, natural recovery process. Together with this, the weight that they had gained during pregnancy had also decreased. Three participants, however, spoke about feelings of discomfort and dissatisfaction with their body weight and shape in this transition phase.

At the athletic level, participants reported taking a gradual approach to their training regime after childbirth. This usually represented starting with some basic exercises for pelvic floor muscles and trunk stabilization, and slowly continuing to a more vigorous training regime paying special attention to areas that were prone to injuries before pregnancy. One of the participants decided to hire a personal trainer experienced in post-partum exercise who helped her in her progress from the ‘zero starting point immediately after birth’. Women differed in the time when they started their normal training again after childbirth: ranging from 10 weeks to 9 months after childbirth. Selected timing was mainly based on athletes’ physical status and feelings of pain or discomfort. As one of the participants explained:

At first, I was planning to return to my pre-pregnancy training regime three months after having a baby. But I didn’t feel physically ready for it, so I decided to devote myself 100% to the child for the first year and returned only later.

When the participants compared this phase with the time before they were pregnant, they identified a major decrease in their physical shape, and in their rest and recovery time (due to their obligations to take care of the baby). On the other hand, they did not perceive a loss in their technical performance, as explained by one of the participants:

After all those years I spent in this sport, I surely knew how to play. Technically and tactically speaking, I was already at my previous best level; what I was still missing was the physical endurance and power I had before pregnancy.

At the psychological level, mother-athletes reported possessing a strong motivation after childbirth to continue with their athletic career. Their motives for pursuing with their athletic engagement included: a strong passion for their sport, enjoyment of being an elite athlete, a strong wish to qualify and perform in (another) OG, and a desire to turn performance at the OG into a family experience. One of the women confessed that her motive to return to competitive sport after childbirth was to see whether it was possible to reach her previous level of performance and also to end her athletic career with a ‘proper finish’. This participant decided to retire from sport after making a successful comeback by performing at a World Championship.

A clear change in priorities occurred after becoming mothers: participants reported that their newly-established family became more important than their athletic career. Although their athletic career was still perceived as being very important to them, participants were not willing to invest everything in sport anymore; e.g. ‘I wouldn’t risk my baby’s health or continue with my training if she would evidently suffer from my absence’. Mother-athletes also spoke about the way motherhood changed them as a person and how this influenced their athletic work: they became more resilient (e.g. instead of thinking about difficulties, they tried to find their inner strength and concentrate on the goal), more patient, more responsible for their actions, and became more able to adapt quicker and better to changing situations. Life gained a new perspective for them (e.g. ‘Everything gained its purpose when I had a child’). As a consequence of this new perspective on life and sport, they felt less pressure to perform: ‘If I don’t succeed to qualify for the next OG, my child is more important to me than that; therefore, I am not afraid of experiencing failure’. Women experienced a positive dissociation between the role of an athlete and a role of a mother. They perceived their athletic training as having ‘time off’ from being a mother. As one woman explained: ‘My training is reserved just for me, it is ‘time off’ for me… I admit it: when I am in the gym, I don’t even think about my child’. Similarly, they reported leaving aside their thoughts about their athletic career when they were with their baby.

When talking about the way they combined their athletic role with motherhood, mother-athletes reported making many compromises and finding different ways to successfully fulfil the demands of their athletic careers and motherhood. They tried to organize their activities and optimize their time as much as possible:

Before I became a mother, I was always on the pitch at least 15 minutes before the training in order to warm up properly and mentally prepare myself. Now I try to optimize my time; I breastfeed my daughter, go straight to the training, and afterwards immediately return in order to feed my daughter again. However, every minute of the training is totally used, because I know why I am there.

Although the combination of taking care of a baby while at the same time being involved in sport was perceived as challenging, women also spoke of the benefits that sport was having on their motherhood. They reported feeling more energized after their athletic training and having more energy for their responsibilities as a mother after they finished their workout.

When I am with my baby, I think I am more present at that time than the mothers who spent 24h per day with their child and don’t train as I do. I spend 21h per day with my daughter but I think those hours are maximally well spent.

Women believed that motherhood significantly influenced their general well-being in the first year after childbirth. While six participants reported experiencing a higher sense of wellbeing soon after becoming a mother, two participants admitted their wellbeing had decreased in the first year after childbirth; e.g. “A lot of people said to me: ‘Oh, the first year of being a mother is such a great period.’ I didn’t feel like this at all; I mean, I loved her and everything, but I didn’t enjoy that period that much.” These two athletes experienced a significant loss of their personal freedom and recalled suffering from occasional depressive symptoms (e.g. feelings of sadness, hopelessness, guilt).

They bring you this baby and you feed him, and then again and again… Soon after you realize that it is like a prison, you’ve lost your personal freedom.

At the psychosocial level, mother-athletes clearly positioned their child as being the most important and influential person in their phase of returning back to sport. He/she was perceived as someone who impacted their life completely and influenced how many other activities besides taking care of him/her were they able to do and to what extent. Those women, who started with their athletic work earlier than others, recognized the impact their athletic career had on their baby. They reported how their child was more adaptable and ‘not afraid of other people as some other babies might be’.

For majority of women in this study their partner offered a complete understanding of their pursuits in combining athletic career together with their role as a mother. All participants in this study had a partner who was in some way connected to elite sport; whether being an elite athlete himself (two participants), working as a coach (six participants), or being otherwise professionally connected to sport (two participants). The partner’s connection to elite level sport and his knowledge about its demands was perceived by participants as an important reason why he was able to understand their position and support them. One of the participants recalled how she and her partner organized their trainings so that in the morning one was taking care of the baby, while the other one was in the gym, and in the afternoon, they changed roles.

The parents of the participants and their partner’s parents were identified as an important source of support of their dual mother-athlete responsibilities. All women in this sample reported that their parents understood and supported their decision to return to competitive sport after childbirth. They helped them by, for example, taking care of their baby, moving closer to their home in order to be available to them, adjusting their activities to their daughter’s athletic process, and helping with logistics whenever possible. Three mother-athletes stressed the importance of trusting their parents in taking care of the baby, which enabled them to genuinely focus on their trainings without being worried about their baby. One of the participants reported that her decision to return to competitive sport after becoming a mother was made in agreement with several stakeholders: herself, her partner, and her parents. In this network ‘everyone contributed to this project as much as possible’. She continued:

In the same time, we had also agreed that if it wouldn’t work – if my athletic career would negatively impact the relationship with my partner, family relations or child’s wellbeing – I would stop immediately. I place all these relationships and people higher than my possible third OG.

Two participants, who did not have such family support network, reported being forced to return to sport later than they would have preferred to.

Mother-athletes reported how, unlike their close family and friends, other people responded mainly with surprise when they announced their intention to return to competitive sport. Some people were thrilled and supported them, while others believed that ‘trying to come back was a bad idea’; or implied that ‘having a baby was an appropriate time to retire’. Similar, or even more discouraging, were the responses of official sporting bodies. Participants perceived that only a very limited number of people from sport organizations believed they would be able to return to their previous level after having a child. Their motherhood was clearly connected with an athletic retirement by several important sport organization stakeholders. However, participants claimed that they did not allow this lack of belief amongst others to interfere with their athletic work and some of the women actually turned this shortage of support into a greater motivation to continue (e.g. ‘It put me on fire even more.’).

At the vocational and financial levels, mother-athletes were legally on year-long maternity leave, which gave them a certain level of financial security, coming from government financial support for all Slovene mothers and their children in their first year after birth. Participants noticed that their financial outgoings increased due to expenses connected with the baby. Some of them stressed the fact that their parents’ support in taking care of their baby and allowing them to train was in fact also a financial support: without the help of their parents they would be forced into paying for daily child-care that they probably could not afford. One of the women admitted that one of her motives to return into competitive sport was also to keep the status of a professional athlete and retain the financial support of the Slovene Ministry of Defence. Some female athletes in this study reported that the Slovene National Olympic Committee decided to remove female athletes, who recently gave birth, from the list of possible candidates for the next OG. As a consequence, they were not allowed to receive the financial support that covers the expenses of athletes preparing for the OG.

I think the decision of not listing us as possible candidates for the next OG was really a chauvinist act; the Olympic Committee justified it with the fact that we are mothers now. I mean, I gave birth, but I don’t have any problems now that would harm my athletic career! On the other hand the Olympic Committee decided to include some currently injured athletes on this list where there is no guarantee they will return back to competitive sport.

Living the life of a mother athlete phase

Approximately one year after childbirth, mother-athletes noticed a sense of culmination in their transition from being an elite athlete into a mother athlete. They reported feeling more adjusted to their dual role of mother-athlete and were noticing fewer changes in all spheres of their functioning.

Reporting about their physical level, women did not focus so much on the effects that their pregnancy and childbirth had had on their body as they did in previous phases. Instead, they talked more about their aging body. All of the participants noticed the process of aging and its consequences both on their athletic performance, as well as on their capabilities for taking care of their child. Being physically too old for competitive sport was also a reason why two participants decided to finish their athletic career soon after returning back to sport. Some mother-athletes admitted paying less attention to appropriate nutrition, rest and recovery time. These were consequences of their maternal responsibilities, which took up much of their time and energy, as well as the ability to stick with their prescribed routine. On the other hand, participants noticed that in comparison to previous stages of their athletic career, they were now able to listen to their bodies better and take more rest from sport when needed.

Mother-athletes reported spending fewer hours in training per week in comparison to their pre-pregnancy phase. They reported how their athletic career was a constant compromise between their family life and sport. On one hand, they were taking away some of the time they would otherwise use for their family by training or attending competitions and on the other hand, they often sacrificed training to be with their child, especially if she/he was sick and needed extra care.

Now that my daughter is in kindergarten, she is frequently sick and must stay at home. In such cases I also stay at home with her, meaning that I sometimes don’t train for three or four days in a row.

However, female athletes in this study believed they used their time for sport very effectively by ‘training hard’, ‘being there with my head 100%’, and substituting a lower frequency of training with the athletic knowledge they gained throughout their athletic career.

At the psychological level, participants perceived having less personal difficulties than in previous phases of their transition to becoming a mother-athlete. In general, they perceived that their motherhood had a positive effect on their general wellbeing by giving them a ‘more positive outlook on life’. Their worries and major sources of stress were mainly concerned with their child’s health, safety, and wellbeing. Although all participants reported having a strong motivation to continue with their athletic career, they felt less pressure to succeed and were less mentally occupied with possible failures:

Before I had a child, the rest of my day after training depended on how my training went. If I didn’t do well, I was in a bad mood for the rest of the day. Now I come home and totally forget about it. I don’t have time to think about it since I am too occupied with other things; I need to pick up my child, prepare a meal for her, play with her…

They reported struggling with occasional self-criticism and self-doubts about their capabilities as a mother. When combining athletic obligations with maternity care, female athletes perceived several difficulties, such as facing constant changes, which required a high level of flexibility and adaptability from them, frequently being alone with their child, feelings of guilt for involving others (i.e. parents, partner) in taking care of their child. Nevertheless, they perceived that being an elite athlete also gave them certain advantages in comparison with other non-athlete mothers (e.g. it allowed them to be more flexible with the regards to their time schedule).

Participants suggested that becoming a mother had significantly influenced their athletic career, but not in a negative way. They reported feeling a strong passion and love for sport, while believing that motherhood turned them into a more resilient athlete, as expressed by one of the mother-athletes: ‘When you have a child, you have that sense of being able to achieve everything is possible and to successfully handle all adversities’. Although all participants declared their child as being more important for them than their athletic success, they recognized that their identity consisted of being an athlete and a mother in equal measure.

I am a triathlete and a mother, these two roles describe me, these two things I do, the rest I am leaving for later phases in my life.

Mother-athletes also recognized how their involvement in elite level sport influenced their relationship with their child and their parenting style. Despite being substantially absent due to their athletic obligations, participants tried to spend as much time as possible with their child. They also believed that their athletic career brought several benefits for both their child as well as for the whole family: it allowed them greater time flexibility, their child was able to see different places and gained additional knowledge when he/she was joining her on her travels due to training and competitions.

I don’t want to be that type of a mother who is with her child 24h per day, I cannot be. As a consequence, my son is much more independent than his peers.

On the other hand, one of the participants noticed also some negative impacts that her longer absences from home due to her athletic training abroad had had on her child (e.g. change in her son’s behaviour in school).

When talking about their relationship with partners, mother-athletes reported having more disagreements in their partner relationships than before parenthood. These tensions mainly occurred due to their home responsibilities. Most participants perceived that they needed to put in more effort to keep their relationship with their partner working on the same level as it did before, because they were both occupied with their careers and often felt tired. One of the participants broke up with her partner during this phase. She recalled that her partner had not supported her athletic engagement (despite being a semi-professional athlete himself) and had perceived her investment in sport as egoistic. Mother-athletes in this study shared an opinion that female athletes are in the underprivileged position than male athletes when it comes to parenthood, usually because ‘mothers are the ones who take care of children, allowing father athletes to train without restrictions’.

When talking about their relationship with coach, four participants noted that their coach became less important for them than in previous stages of their career. However, all mother-athletes in this study acknowledged their coach’s support for combining their role of a mother with being an athlete, and their understanding of their responsibilities as a mother. One of the participants reported that her coach had moved closer to her, so that she was able to train closer to her home and stay with her son.

At the vocational and financial level, seven participants still sustained their professional athletes’ status with government financial support for elite athletes. One participant, however, lost her position as a professional athlete and government support, because she failed to maintain the required level of her athletic results. She claimed that the reason for this was her almost two-year long absence from competitions due to her pregnancy and time after birth.

Conclusion

This research found that female athletes’ transition to motherhood can be perceived as a process, starting before pregnancy and lasting (at least) until woman’s new identity of a mother-athlete was developed. Three phases were identified within this process, namely the pre-pregnancy and pregnancy phase, the phase of returning to competitive sport, and the phase of living the life of a mother-athlete. Throughout these three transition phases, motherhood and athletic career appeared as mutually interconnected, with the transition occurring not only at different levels of athletes’ development as proposed by the HAC model (Wylleman, Reints, and De Knop 2013) (i.e. physical, athletic, psychological, psychosocial, academic/vocational, and financial), but also in reciprocal interactions between the levels.

Athletic career seemed to dictate female athletes’ important decisions prior to or during their pregnancy, such as selected time to conceive, or the type and amount of athletic activity during pregnancy. A close interconnection between the athletic sphere and the private sphere resulted in participants’ ambivalent feelings about their pregnancy: on the one hand, they were enthusiastic about the forthcoming parenthood and on the other, they regretted their (temporary) withdrawal from elite sport. Women stressed the important role of significant others, especially their partner, family, and coach, in supporting their athletic investments and allowing them to make meaningful decisions about elite sport and motherhood (reported also by Darroch and Hillsburg 2017), which confirms a close interconnection between the athletic and psychosocial levels. However, their interaction did not always appear as positive: participants reported facing strong expectations from their social environment (i.e. family members and others) to decrease their level of athletic work due to safety reasons. Also, they mentioned facing several general assumptions and social norms considering the appropriate level of physical activity for pregnant women, supporting the notion that culture, rather than biology, determines what behaviour and attitudes are appropriate for mothers (Douglas and Michaels 2004).

Becoming a mother was perceived as a very transformative process, which occurred with significant physical, psychological, psychosocial, athletic, and financial changes. Obtaining the new psychosocial role of being a mother with all its corresponding obligations strongly influenced participants’ athletic level of development, especially their practice and rest time. Participants recognized devoting less time for training; however, they demonstrated a more strategic approach towards athletic work, for example, by replacing reduced time spent on athletic activities with time being spent more efficiently, taking advantage of their obtained athletic experiences and knowledge, and therefore maximizing their athletic performance (Palmer and Leberman 2009). Also, participants’ transition into motherhood resulted in several psychological changes, which strongly influenced their athletic work such as greater resilience, patience, and responsibility for their athletic career. As a result, they developed into a more autonomous athlete who carefully selects her actions. Our study findings confirm that combining motherhood with athletic career can culminate in a greater sense of well-being (Leberman and Palmer 2009), perceptions of competence, empowerment and personal growth (Batey and Owton 2014; McGannon et al. 2012). Mother-athletes in this study show that being a mother in elite sport can result in reduced sense of athletic pressure, as well as in increased capacity to cope with performance stress and increased enjoyment of the athletic activity supporting the notion that motherhood can stimulate the athlete to become a more balanced person (Leberman and Palmer 2009). Some informants experienced that not participating in sport during pregnancy was difficult for them, but it also provided them with a lower standard from which they were able to regain sporting achievements. Also, the expectations about how they should manage in competition with other athletes seems to be reduced, since motherhood appears as a plausible explanation for not making it back to the same standard. As such it seems that the informants come to enjoy participating in elite sports again. Their motivation for sport did not decrease, rather it gained an additional aspect. As found in previous research (Darroch and Hillsburg 2017; Leberman and Palmer 2009; McGannon et al. 2012), motherhood gave female athletes a different perspective on life, and made the awareness of their athletic goals and important things in life even stronger.

Physical condition together with the available psychosocial support influenced the time when mother-athletes decided to return to competitive sport and their perceived level of difficulties in this process. Personal support networks of mothers in our study appeared as significantly influential on their athletic endeavours, which clearly represents a strong reciprocal influence of both the athletic and psychosocial level in female athletes’ development. It also confirms that mother-athletes seem to strongly depend on the support of close family members when juggling their dual responsibilities of being a mother and an elite athlete (Darroch and Hillsburg 2017; McGannon et al. 2012; Palmer and Leberman 2009). Especially the sufficient support of a partner, most likely also an elite athlete himself, allowed female athletes to balance their sport and motherhood, and facilitated engagement in both roles equally and simultaneously (McGannon et al. 2015). A reciprocal influence of the psychosocial and athletic levels was identified with the athletic career impacting mother, as well as her child and a partner. Participants reported feeling empowered, more energized, flexible, and organized as a mother due to their athletic engagement, and experiencing sport as a hiatus from their maternal role, congruent with findings by Darroch and Hillsburg (2017). In comparison to other non-athletic mothers, they perceived themselves as having better discipline, and encouraging more independence, adaptability, and positive health behaviour within their child. Also, by being involved in elite sport, they provided their partner with the opportunity to take on a nurturing role. On the other hand, feelings of guilt, the pressures of having too many obligations, and occasional difficulties with the partner emerged as negative consequences of pursuing both roles (Leberman and Palmer 2009; Carless and Douglas 2012, 2013).

Current study is limited to eight participants. However, this is a fair amount considering the limited number of elite athletes, who become mothers and take up their sports career again, and the difficulties in getting access to and requesting time from mother athletes who obviously lead a very busy life. In order to uncover other possible transitional demands and experiences mother-athletes deal with, future studies should involve women who have not continued their athletic involvement after becoming mothers. Furthermore, only athletes coming from individual sports were involved in the study. In individual sports, athletes have greater degree of freedom in deciding about their training schedule, competitions, daily rhythm, and lifestyle in comparison with team athletes. All mother-athletes in this study recognized this freedom as a great advantage which enabled them to take an individualized approach in their returning process to normal trainings and competitions, as well as enabled them a more flexible combination of elite sport and motherhood. As factors such as other team players, the team’s organization and club’s policies influence female athletes’ transition to motherhood (e.g. Batey and Owton 2014); it would be interesting to investigate transition to motherhood and combination of sport and motherhood among female team athletes. Findings of this study point to the structural and very critical issue that female athletes under pregnancy may lose their financial support, which can (as reported by one of the informants) finally lead to the retirement. We recommend that future studies examine and compare various sociocultural contexts in terms of the roles which individual national sports governing bodies play in supporting female athletes deciding for and making their transition to motherhood. Nevertheless, this study findings ensure a broader as well as more detailed scope of knowledge on female athletes’ transition to motherhood and can assist sport coaches, managers, sport psychology practitioners, and sport organizations in gaining a better understanding of this transitional process in female athletes’ careers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.