‘Busy as a bee’: a qualitative dual analysis of life fulfillment among Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers in endurance sports

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the present study was to explore the experiences of meaning-making relating to psychological well-being (PWB) among Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers while training for and competing in different endurance sports. The participants were six Norwegian women in the age range of 35–46 (M_age = 39.17) years; all were university college graduates in full-time employment who had at least one child (under 18 years of age) and trained for an average of 10 hours per week. The data collection method was semi-structured interviews and a qualitative dual analysis combining thematic analysis (TA) and interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) was used. This decision was made for obtaining a complex, multi-layered description in both breadth and depth of competitive recreational athlete mothers’ sport experiences. TA resulted in creation of four themes: (a) motivation; (b) sportswoman; (c) body and health; and (d) PWB. The analysis revealed how PWB explained through life fulfillment was pre-eminent in the participants’ sport experiences. The IPA of the meaning-making relating to the life fulfillment theme displayed the importance of a) My game and no shame, b) Solution-focused and adaptable, and c) A sporting life is a fulfilling life. The dual analysis enabled us to unpack different possible meanings of the different PWB components that seem to play an important role in the lifeworld of Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers. Future research should continue to make use of various qualitative analytic approaches to investigate key psychosocial aspects of competitive recreational athlete mothers’ sport experiences.

KEYWORDS:

• dual analysis
• endurance sports
• female athletes
• gratification
• motherhood

Introduction

Previous publications have explored competitive recreational athlete mothers’ subjective meanings of sports training and competition in relation to their everyday lives. More research, however, is still needed to understand the nuanced psychosocial aspects of motherhood and meaning-making in the sociocultural context of their athletic careers (Bean and Wimbs 2021, McGannon, Tatarnic, and McMahon 2019, Smith 2019, Walsh et al. 2018). Specifically, previous research has revealed that particularly for women, cultural narratives of incompatibility between having children and being a competitive recreational female athlete are still strong, leading women to view their athletic careers as a project to be conducted before parenthood (Appleby and Fisher 2009, Ronkainen, Watkins, and Ryba 2016, Walsh et al. 2018). Nevertheless, some women continue pursuing their athletic careers after becoming mothers and this line of research has evolved during the last couple of years (Bean and Wimbs 2021, McGannon and McMahon 2021, McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018, McGannon, Tatarnic, and McMahon 2019).

From a North American cultural perspective, it has been argued that women are juggling motherhood and sport participation. Specifically, it has been shown through several studies that mothers are likely to meet resistance from family members and their wider social context (e.g. Bean and Wimbs 2021, McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018). Hence, rather than choosing autonomously (i.e. not feeling coerced to meet other’s needs, preferences, and expectations) to attain sport training and competitive goals, mothers usually end up with feelings of responsibility for upholding a semblance of harmony within the family (McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018). Indeed, Bean and Wimbs (2021) argue that the perceived motherload, which is experienced by mothers, is likely to result in feelings of stress, guilt, and shame. These feelings might also be reinforced by societal norms and expectations, arguing that mothers should exclusively focus on their children’s needs instead of taking their own needs and preferences into account. For instance, recent studies indicate that women who have become mothers need post-partum physical activity engagement in addition to acknowledging their ‘new bodies’ as capable of reaching new competitive performances, which, in turn, might mitigate mothers’ perceptions of role overload (Bean and Wimbs 2021, McGannon and McMahon 2021). Hence, several mothers have indicated that they use sport training and competition to re-connect themselves with their whole sense of self (McGannon and McMahon 2021). However, in the process of prioritising training and competition, and, thus, reclaiming normalcy and something distinct for themselves (McGannon and McMahon 2021), women often feel like better mothers when they can pass their love and passion for an active lifestyle on to the next generation (Bean and Wimbs 2021). Thus, it seems reasonable to argue that the ‘athlete mum journey’ requires a flexible mindset if women are choosing to take on sport training and competition while managing the societal norms and expectations as well as attending to the intensive mothering duties within the family (McGannon and McMahon 2021, McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018).

In Scandinavia, there is a tendency for athlete mothers to train and compete in a range of endurance sports, including triathlons, cycling, and marathons (Overgaard et al. 2014). These athlete mothers are characterised by Overgaard et al. (2014) as women who exercise daily and train intensively (i.e. to near exhaustion), meaning they run for more than 6 hours and cycle for more than 10 hours per week. Despite previous research showing that competitive recreational athlete mothers may experience challenges in balancing or juggling work and family life with sports training and competition (Appleby and Fisher 2009, Boles, Howard, and Donofrio 2001, McGannon and Schinke 2013, McGannon et al. 2015, Noblet and Gifford 2002), other studies have revealed that sport participation, even intensive exercise, can foster a wide range of positive psychosocial outcomes for women, including feelings of empowerment and self-sufficiency, as well as increase their confidence, determination, and self-respect (Ferguson et al. 2019, Leipert et al. 2011). In other studies, researchers have found that female athletes utilise self-compassion to promote performance perception and well-being when training and competing (Adam, Eke, and Ferguson 2021, Bean and Wimbs 2021). Such sport involvement may foster benefits that include a tendency to face the world with an assertive mindset (Leipert et al. 2011). These aspects related to sport participation and involvement are likely to develop psychological well-being (PWB), a multidimensional concept that refers to having a positive image of oneself and one’s personal life, including aspects of self-esteem and life satisfaction (Leipert et al. 2011, Ryff 1989, 2014, Ryff and Keyes 1995).

Well-being is a complex construct that concerns optimal experience and functioning (Diener et al. 2017). For instance, Giles et al. (2020) claim that there is increasing emphasis on the development of appropriate sports-specific measures of participants’ well-being, which is necessary to advance our understanding and support athletes’ health and performance more effectively. These authors suggest that well-being should be distinguished in four domains: emotional well-being/subjective well-being (SWB), mental well-being/PWB, social well-being, and physical well-being (Giles et al. 2020). The term in the broader literature, however, is often dichotomised. Specifically, SWB is an evaluation of life in terms of satisfaction and balance between positive and negative affect, whereas PWB entails perception of engagement with existential challenges of life (Keyes, Shmotkin, and Ryff 2002).

Further, Ryff 1989, 2014) recognises six dimensions of PWB: (a) purpose in life; (b) autonomy; (c) self-acceptance; (d) personal growth; (e) environmental mastery; and (f) positive relations with others. The dimensions are abridged here; detailed explanations can be found in Ryff’s work (Ryff 1989, 2014). Important attributes in psychological functioning are having a beneficial attitude about oneself as well as effective involvement in and proficiency in one’s environment (Ryff 1989). Moreover, being highly empathetic and affectionate as well as having positive relationships with others are key factors in self-realisation and maturity (Ryff 1989). According to Ryff (1989), having the mental strength to follow personal principles, even when social pressure challenges them, shows autonomy and is a main feature in self-realisation. Ryff (1989, 2014) also suggests that personal growth occurs when talents and potential are developed over time and is significant for achieving positive psychological functioning in areas such as family life and being a wife and/or a mother.

Based on the notion that mothers are a typically hard group to reach, Walsh et al. (2018) found that mothers who were engaged in netball developed long-term participation through feelings of empowerment and well-being. Investigating competitive recreational athlete mothers’ preparation for and competition in endurance sports seems, therefore, relevant for exploring the psychosocial outcomes of their seemingly frantic lives as ‘busy bees’ (Ferguson et al. 2019, Giles et al. 2020, Ryff 2013). Thus, as the Norwegian government has been working for equality and women’s rights over the last decades, the purpose of the present study was to explore the experiences of Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers while training for and competing in different endurance sports. Additionally, using Ryff’s (1989, 2014) theoretical framework, we further examined the meaning-making relating to PWB among the competitive recreational athlete mothers.

Methods

Research paradigm and study design

The research questions required an interpretive approach, so qualitative methods such as semi-structured interviews (e.g. Kvale and Brinkmann 2009), dual analysis of the dataset using thematic analysis (TA; e.g. Braun and Clarke 2006, Braun and Clarke 2020, Braun and Clarke 2021a) and interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA; e.g. Smith 2011, 2016, Smith, Flowers and Larkin 2009) were applied. The chosen methodological approach allows for a broader and deeper examination of how PWB enables these competitive recreational athlete mothers to benefit from training for and competing in various endurance sports. Thereby, in terms of procedure and underlying philosophy, the present study was underpinned by a relativist ontology and situated within a subjectivist epistemology focus on how people make sense of their reality and how collective definitions of reality shape and direct human thoughts and behaviours (Delanty and Strydom 2003, Smith and Sparkes 2016, Wahyuni 2012). We used qualitative descriptive methodology for generating, interpreting, and creating knowledge regarding the complexities of the phenomenon studied. For instance, interviews and triangulation between TA and IPA data analyses were used complementarily to examine the breadth and depth of participants’ context-bound meaning-making (Smith 2019, Smith and McGannon 2018, Spiers and Riley 2019).

Participants

We sought to collect and analyse in-depth information on the thoughts and experiences of key informants concerning the phenomenon of interest. Therefore, the second author – a competitive recreational athlete mother herself – started recruiting potential informants in her own athletic environment of endurance sports. During the recruitment process, athlete mothers were invited to participate in this study if they: (a) were the mother of at least one child under the age of 18 years of age; (b) were in full-time employment; (c) had completed higher education (e.g. college, university); (d) were currently competing in different endurance sports (e.g. swimming, running, cycling, triathlon); and (e) were training for a minimum of 10 hours per week.

Given the limited number of eligible participants, participants were sought from across the country, and personal blogs were investigated. Subsequently, six Norwegian female endurance athletes aged 35–46 (M_age = 39.17) years agreed to participate in this study. All participants met the inclusion criteria. Two of the athlete mothers competed in long-distance running, two in triathlons, one in cycling, and one in swimming. In general, the small number of participants in this study means that care is required in the interpretation process, but in fact, most IPA studies are of small numbers, varying from five to 10 participants (Smith and Osborn, 2015, Smith, 2016, 2019). In addition, Malterud, Siersma and Guassora (2016) claim that a study of six participants is sufficient to gain detailed descriptions of the phenomenon experienced.

Procedure

The participants were contacted by email. All contacted participants expressed interest and were informed in a letter as well as orally about the study and their rights as participants. Informed consent was obtained from all participants. The procedure for conducting the semi-structured interviews was chosen by the participants; three were interviewed in their homes, one was interviewed in her workplace, and two were interviewed by video (via Zoom). The interviews lasted between 45 and 65 minutes and resulted in a total of 62 pages of raw data (single-spaced, Times New Roman font size 12, in Microsoft Office for Mac 2011). Initially, a pilot interview was conducted. The data were included in the study because the changes to the interview guide following the interview were minimal, and access to relevant participants for this kind of study is limited. In compliance with ethical requirements, the participants have been anonymised and given pseudonyms and other identifying information has been removed.

Instrumentation

Interview guide

A semi-structured interview guide was developed to explore the participants’ experiences of investing time and energy in demanding endurance sports. The interview guide addressed a variety of themes and included questions relating to the participants’ thoughts and experiences concerning family life and their children (McGannon and Schinke 2013, McGannon et al. 2015), work and career (Boles, Howard, and Donofrio 2001, McGannon and Schinke 2013), health and appearance (Krabak, Waite and Schiff 2011; Nash 2011; Sundgot-Borgen and Torstveit 2010), and fulfillment in life (Miquelon and Vallerand 2006, Ryff 1989, 2013, 2014). The interview guide was approved by the Norwegian Social Science Data Services.

Dual data analysis

Given that the purpose of this study was to explore the thoughts and experiences of competitive recreational athlete mothers while training for and competing in different endurance sports, we conducted a dual analysis of the dataset pairing thematic analysis (TA) and interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA). Moreover, combining such methods enables qualitative researchers a deep and prolonged data immersion, thoughtfulness, and reflection to make the analytic process transparent and pluralistic (Spiers and Riley 2019).

Following the recommendation of Spiers and Riley (2019), the dual analysis of the dataset was conducted by the whole research team to ensure coding reliability and testing for consistency of judgement. Given the second author’s presuppositions as a competitive recreational athlete mother combined with the use of TA and IPA, these processes may be seen as mixing the participants’ and researchers’ words and experiences, which resonate with each other and reveal reflexivity in the research (Braun and Clarke 2021b, Braun and Clarke 2020, Dahlberg and Dahlberg 2020, Goldspink and Engward 2019). Such reflexive approaches as well as the researcher being both inside and outside the research are often regarded as necessary to provide insight into a phenomenon (Goldspink and Engward 2019). Both TA and IPA were employed to gain both breadth and depth as well as to establish the validity and consistency of the data (Braun and Clarke 2021b, Braun and Clarke 2020, Spiers and Riley 2019).

The data analysis followed two main steps. Step 1: The interviews were transcribed verbatim immediately after completion and subjected to TA (e.g. Braun and Clarke 2006, Braun and Clarke 2020). TA was used to explore the experiences of the six participants and deemed to be an appropriate analytic method for addressing the first part of the objective for this study; explore the experiences of Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers while training for and competing in different endurance sports. To analyse important generic themes, NVivo qualitative analysis software (NVivo 12 for Mac Essentials) was used to organise and sort data in the generated themes. The analysis of the dataset was conducted by both the first and second author, separately. Separate code books with generated themes obtained were then discussed by the two authors until consensus and understanding of the dataset was achieved. This iterative process led to a review of the themes to assess if the proposed themes resonated with and fairly reflected the data. Finally, the following four themes were labelled: (a) motivation; (b) sportswoman; (c) body and health; and (d) PWB.

Step 2: Following a discussion in the research team (third author included) of the TA of the whole data corpus and given the second part of the objective of the present study, we concluded that TA is not a method for all purposes as Braun and Clarke, 2021a) themselves emphasise. The different themes generated through TA were identified at a semantic level although consideration was given to possible deeper, latent content in communicated concepts (Hallett and Lamont 2015). Instead of trying to make TA fit and for creating a description not only in breadth but also in depth, we conducted an IPA (e.g. Smith and Dunworth 2003, Smith and Osborn 2015, Smith 1999, 2011, 2016, 2019, Smith, Flowers, and Larkin 2009) for the data corpus related to the theme PWB. IPA is designed to focus on existential, idiographic elements by unpicking individuals’ meaning-making about their experiences (Smith et al. 2009). The meaning-making of Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers and their lifeworld, which most certainly are complex, ambiguous, and emotionally laden and, thus, the IPA can be a useful methodology for examining such topics (Smith and Osborn 2015).

We started the analytic process with a detailed examination of the meaning-making relating to PWB of one of these competitive recreational athlete mothers until some degree of closure had been achieved in the whole research team. By using such a holistic analysis, we seek to discern the narrative structure and central plot in the meaning-making of PWB unique for each participant with an aim to capture the core meanings and structure that bring coherence, focus, and depth related to the different stories of the Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers (Smith 2019). Further, we used free imaginative variation to determine the essence of the participants’ described meaning-making of PWB. The meaning units were synthesised into an aggregate of meanings (i.e. fundamental meanings that are essential for the phenomenon to present itself as is), which became the general structure for the phenomenon of meaning-making relating to PWB among the competitive recreational athlete mothers (Ferguson et al. 2019).Then, we moved to a detailed analysis of the second case and so on through the corpus of cases (Smith 2004).

Findings

During the data analysis process, we acknowledged that our dataset would benefit from a range of analytic approaches to unpack different possible meanings within it (Braun, Clarke, and Weate 2016; Frost et al. 2010; Sandelowski 2011). Hence, after completing the TA, our data showed that PWB through life fulfillment was a key component in the experiences of the participants in this study. Thus, we interrogated our data using IPA (Smith 2016, 2019). We propose three main themes: a) My game and no shame, b) Solution-focused and adaptable, and c) A sporting life is a fulfilling life. We suggest that these three themes capture the structure of the meaning-making for the Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers in their ongoing process of life fulfillment.

My game and no shame

The first theme illustrates how the participants agree about the expectations and pressures on women in the household, which, in turn, makes it more difficult, and in some cases also necessary to deal with relational disapproval, for women to exercise daily and train intensively. The quote by Susan illustrates comments she believes she would not have received if she was a man. Indeed, she believes it would be easier to exercise and commit to the sport if she was the man of the household:

That’s one of my standard phrases; it’s like, yes, and you would not have said that if I was a man! And I think it would have been much, much easier to do this if I had been the man in the family. I could have trained even more.

Ellen continues by elaborating on her experience that many have opinions about mothers who spend time away from their children. She does not believe it is about the training itself, but rather that she is the mother and not the father. She finds that others do not comment when her husband is away from the household for extended periods of time and she is home alone with their child, but everyone has an opinion when she, the mother, is gone from the household:

A lot of people have opinions about mothers committed to sports, or mothers who are away from their children a lot. It’s not really about the training. It’s somehow all right when daddy is gone; it doesn’t matter. There are no comments when my husband is gone for work, and I’m home alone for ten days with the child. However, when I go away for ten days for work, and my husband is home alone with our child, everyone has an opinion about that! [laughter]

Vivian further elaborates on the perceived support within the household. Vivian underlines that her spouse’s opinion is significant; hence, she seeks confirmation and recognition from him that what she is doing is okay. The quote from Vivian illustrates how she appreciates her spouse’s consent to her pursuit as a great gift:

And I remember it was like the best gift I could get. I was so happy, okay, well I’ve come to the finish line, but then I got recognition as well, acceptance from him to keep doing what I liked. It was kind of the greatest.

Conversely, Susan experiences no support from her husband for her heavily engagement in endurance sport. She feels that her husband wishes she did not have commitments at this competitive level, but she still chooses to live with her husband’s disapproval and continues to participate anyway:

Oh, I know that. He’s not happy about it at all. Whatsoever. Of course, it has made it very, very weird, and very, very extraordinary that I’ve no support at home to participate in competitive sports.

Although these quotes show some variation between the participants, they still demonstrate that women in the Norwegian society must explain and justify their own choices regarding participation and competition in endurance sports. While the lack of confirmation and recognition from others might elicit compensatory behaviour, the analysis revealed that the participants chose to structure their daily life based on their own personal needs, preferences, and goals.

Solution-focused and adaptable

The second theme illustrates how the participants structure their daily lives in such a way that they are able to prioritise their children, work, and training. These conscious choices showcase that the participants are good at finding alternative solutions, which promotes daily life experiences for increased well-being. The following quote shows how Vivian always puts her children first, but at the same time how she prioritises her daily chores in such a way that she can get other things done as well:

The children always come first, of course, they do, but I think that I’m always very good at finding alternative solutions so that I can get things done.

Like Vivian, Susan emphasises the benefits of having a flexible job situation, enabling her to be a competitive recreational athlete mother:

The last year I’ve invested in my sport career, and I’ve trained when the children have been at school and the husband has been at work, so it has not been such a dilemma for me as perhaps for many others in full-time work. I work, but I work in a completely different way. I’ve got a 100% flexible job. And then I’ve had the opportunity to be able to work less in the past year.

Ellen continues by explaining how she has chosen to start her own company to improve her everyday life, which has led her to have much more time with her family than she had before. The quote shows how she prioritises her family in her daily life and feels that it would not have been possible if she had not worked as a self-employed person:

Especially after I quit my regular job and had my own company, I’m much more flexible. Now I work in the morning, train in the morning, and I’m home when my children come home from school, so I can rather work again in the evening. I’ve never really seen or had as much time with my family as I do now. But it was a conscious choice to start my own company to make it happen.

Caroline nuances and reinforces the importance of combining a professional career with the welfare of her children:

My children always come first, the job means an incredible amount to me, but I’m not willing to take a job that would mean that I could not do my sport. Then I would have rather kept the job I’ve got today.

Kristin who is married to a sporting husband expands the other’s perspectives by arguing that the weekends can be a bit more challenging than the weekdays when it comes to prioritising the needs and preferences of the whole family, but she highlights the need to improve one’s adaptability skills:

I don’t feel that I’m deprioritising the training, but for example during the weekends, we’re maybe the kind of family that is very happy to go out in nature and do things like that, but now it kind of becomes like that, the one train first, then the other train, and then the family goes out. So, it’s obvious, there may be a little less time for things like that, but we prioritise it, absolutely.

The competitive recreational athlete mothers in our study describe in great depth how they can make deliberate choices, which facilitate experiences related to feelings of well-being. In this subtheme, it has been shown how heavily engagement in endurance sports, along with other personal responsibilities, is considered a worthwhile contribution to these women’s daily functioning.

A sporting life is a fulfilling life

The third and final theme explores the participants’ experiences of training in relation to their sense of self, identity, and general health. Engaging with endurance sport at the competitive recreational level plays an essential role in controlling the chaos in their daily routine. The following extract from Caroline captures how she attributes her assiduity in training and commitment to the sport to the pursuit of becoming the best possible version of herself:

Yes, you self-realise, but you … it’s also about becoming the best version of yourself. I can be incredibly tired after work or other things, but when I’m done training, it’s almost like I’ve got a new day or rescheduled my head. So, I’m controlling the chaos in many ways by training.

Complementing the extract from Caroline, Ellen experiences the training at this level of engagement as a healthy madness. She finds it problematic to get sufficient sleep and it can be difficult to obtain the nutrition her body needs. Nevertheless, she finds prioritising training to be important to her life fulfillment:

It’s a healthy madness. No, I’m just kidding. If you sleep enough and eat enough, things go well. It’s a challenge as the mother of a toddler. You seldom get enough sleep, but eating enough is no problem, but sleeping enough, it has been a huge problem. So, for me, it’s like, it’s not always healthy to do a hard exercise, you might have to sleep during the day instead, but at the same time, it’s mentally healthy for me to exercise.

Vivian also finds the amount of training and competing in endurance sport necessary for herself and she believes it benefits her daily life and functioning. She has realised that she gains increased energy from regular training and competing in her endurance sport:

Exercising really matters to me. It’s maybe a bit strange to say, but I feel I gain huge energy from training and competing regularly.

Contributing to the understanding of these competitive recreational athlete mothers’ training and sport commitment, Ellen describes her experiences of training and commitment in terms of searching for her maximum potential. In her opinion, she has not yet reached her full potential and is steadily trying to improve her performance:

Yes, it is. Because I always want to see how much – I know I haven’t reached my maximum potential! So, I always want to become a little bit better, and a little bit better, and a little bit better. It’s a form of self-realisation, yes.

Conversely, the quote from Kristin describes how she already has fulfilled the self-realisation aspect of competitive sport at an earlier stage of her athletic career. She now feels that participation in competitive recreational sport is part of her identity:

No, you know, I don’t feel that it is. Because now I kind of feel … that self-realisation related to running, I’ve already had that, I suppose. But it’s more about me and my identity, it’s more my well-being, somehow.

Knowing that engagement with training and competition can have multiple meanings for the participants, Susan believes that being a competitive recreational athlete mother should be fun and gratifying, and that the result should be a healthy body in the long run:

Training for me is a healthy body, whether you have a few extra kilos, it doesn’t matter, but the body should be used, and it should be fun, it should be pleasurable, you should enjoy it because you are going to do it for the rest of your life.

Here, Susan explicitly connects her training and competition in endurance sport with her need to have fun and experience gratifying activities. For her, it is necessary that the activity is perceived as pleasurable because she intends to keep training for the rest of her life. Supporting the view that sport participation should involve a broad range of experiences, Kate finds herself wishing for more than a good result when competing. She strongly feels that competitions should offer vast experiences of the natural surroundings and be a social meeting point, but she also admits that it is essential to fight for the win in competitions:

Yes, there must be something more than trying to get on the podium. It must be an experience of nature; it must be a social event or having the chance to fight for the first place, because that’s also great fun.

In this final subtheme, it has been shown how training and competing in endurance sports offer a range of opportunities to live a fulfilling life. To remain fully involved in several domains of life, the participants train and compete not only to keep in shape and be at the top of their game, but also to experience moments of joy and delight.

Discussion

The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers training for and competing in endurance sports. The dual analysis of the data revealed that Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers experienced increased levels of PWB through participation in endurance sports, especially through having goals and objectives that give their frantic lives meaning. They experienced environmental mastery, autonomy, and personal growth, which, in turn, enabled them to manage everyday life challenges, and have the strength to follow personal convictions (Braun, Clarke, and Weate 2016; Deci and Ryan 2008; Diener et al. 2017; Nash 2011; Ryff 2014). The findings revealed a life fulfillment through being independent and ignoring social stigma, being solution focused and adaptable, and receiving recognition and fulfilling everyday life through being a competitive recreational athlete mother. In this way, our findings are in line with the conclusions of the research conducted on competitive recreational athlete mothers in the North American cultural context (e.g. Bean and Wimbs 2021, McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018, Ohlendorf, Anklam, and Gardner 2019). Overall, however, our findings may provide insights into the Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers’ experiences and their social and sporting networks, and this culturally specific meaning-making descriptions may provide a nuanced picture not only for the Norwegian society, but perhaps also covering aspects of the Scandinavian social and cultural context.

Everyday life of Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers

Previous research has revealed that support from the family is especially important to athlete mothers (McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018, McGannon and Schinke 2013, Walsh et al. 2018), which does not seem to apply to all the participants in this study. Indeed, one participant explicitly explained that she had no support at home for her competing in endurance sport. This finding may indicate the importance of competitive recreational athlete mothers’ need for autonomy in relation to participation in endurance sports (Bean and Wimbs 2021, Mercurio and Landry 2008, Ryan et al. 2017, Ryff 1989, 2014). Conversely, other participants seemed to place great emphasis on their spouse’s welfare and could have withdrawn from participation and competition if their spouse had not given them the acceptance or preferably the recognition they needed. Self-assessment according to individual criteria, rather than looking for approval elsewhere, is a characteristic of a fully functioning person (Ryff 1989, 2014). Thus, some findings from our study indicate that even if some of the participants valued their spouse’s opinions and feelings more than those of others, they all seemed to have the internal locus of assessment documented among women who run multiple marathons (Ronkainen, Watkins, and Ryba 2016, Rupprecht and Matkin 2012). Furthermore, the findings suggest that maintenance of training for and competing in different endurance sports can be achieved amongst Norwegian competitive recreational athlete mothers through a cyclical relationship between mastering the sporting environment, receiving recognition from the home environment, and developing a competitive recreational athlete mother identity (Walsh et al. 2018). Some participants were motivated extrinsically by success in endurance sport competitions, while others were more intrinsically motivated by competing because ‘they just love it’ and appreciated the feeling of belongingness to the sporting environment as well as developing as a competitive recreational athlete mother.

By contrast, the participants shared different experiences of their sporting environments (Walsh et al. 2018), meaning that some had received very critical remarks about their sport participation and absence from home, whereas others had received only positive feedback. In fact, there was evidence of an identity shift away from the home environment to the sporting environment for these athlete mothers explaining why they still chose to compete in various endurance sports. Their participation and being part of the sporting environment transformed them to master their home environment, which empowered their position as both mother and wife. Indeed, the participants in the present study emphasised that their identity as competitive recreational athlete mothers were decisive for their environmental mastery and enabled them to value their frantic lives as ‘busy bees’. Nevertheless, it should be mentioned that previous research has documented that in different societies, there is a cultural expectation that women should be the primary (or sole) caregivers of their children (Choi et al. 2005, Overgaard et al. 2014, Ronkainen, Watkins, and Ryba 2016, Tekavc, Wylleman and Cecić Erpič 2020), and some participants indicated that they sometimes felt this also was expected of them. In contrast to previous research, the participants did not consider motherhood and having at least one child under 18 years of age to be a burden to their lives as competitive recreational athlete mothers (Bellows-Riecken and Rhodes 2008). This finding indicates that the participants ignored potential social stigmatisation, thereby mastering both their home and sporting environment in a way that allowed them to pursue their personal life goals (Ryff 1989, 2014). Overall, the findings clearly indicated that the participants gained a sense of PWB through self-realisation as a competitive recreational athlete mother, despite both familial and social obligations.

Furthermore, some participants reported the importance of mastering different roles in life, whereby they achieved a feeling of ‘becoming a better version of themselves’. This kind of statement led us to believe that the sense of autonomy appears to be important for these competitive recreational athlete mothers (Bean and Wimbs 2021, Nash 2011, Ryan et al. 2017). All the participants demonstrated self-acceptance (Ryff 1989, 2014), which one of the participants described clearly when she reported that it would be easier to participate in sports if she was a man. She did not let her gender stop her from pursuing her engagement for training and competing in an endurance sport. Such PWB may be understood as a combination of her athletic emotional experiences, in which she explains her feelings after a training session as ‘it is almost like I have got a new day or rescheduled my head’ as well as her evaluation of her satisfaction with life claiming ‘I am controlling the chaos in many ways by exercising’ (Diener et al. 2017, Nash 2011).

Additionally, the findings revealed that the participants sought to maximise their human potential through achieving goals through the training sessions reaching their maximum potential as competitive recreational athlete mothers, which showed a clear purpose in their lives (Ryff 1989, 2013). Having a purpose and a direction in life with opportunities to realise one’s human potential may produce human flourishing (Diener et al. 2017, Ryff and Singer 1998), and one of the participants emphasised that ‘exercising really matters to me’ and underlined ‘I feel I gain huge energy from training and competing regularly’. Such personal growth and feelings of relatedness facilitate the development of a competitive recreational athlete mother identity, giving rise to feelings of competence not only in the sporting environment, but also in the home environment. These feelings allowed participants to engage in guilt-free endurance training and competitions coupled with feelings of empowerment and well-being (Bean and Wimbs 2021, Walsh et al. 2018). Hence, by exploring the experiences of competitive recreational athlete mothers while training for and competing in different endurance sports and, further, by using Ryff’s (1989, 2014) dimensions of PWB, we have shed some light over the meaning-making relating to PWB among these ‘busy bees’.

Limitations and future directions

The present study is not without limitations, and these issues should be considered when the findings are interpreted. The dual analysis of the data revealed both breadth and depth of the experiences of the competitive recreational athlete mothers. IPA is distinct from TA due to, amongst other things, its focus on the meaning bestowed on phenomena by individuals’ idiographic focus (Smith et al. 2009). Moreover, it is this idiographic focus which drives the smaller sample sizes characteristic of IPA and, as Spiers and Riley (2019) pinpoint, allows the researcher extra time to delve deeply into the data. Nevertheless, the findings of this study do not represent a diverse socio-economic group, and a more heterogeneous population could provide more in-depth insights into sub-cultural demands on women of different ethnicities and socioeconomic status (Choi et al. 2005, McGannon et al. 2015).

In the present study, the second author’s presuppositions as a competitive recreational athlete mother herself in the recruitment of participants, interview process, and TA and IPA analyses may be regarded as necessary reflexivity to provide trustworthy insights into the phenomenon studied. Exploring the thoughts and experiences of her fellow competitive recreational athlete mothers has enabled her to bring greater phenomenological sensibility to the participants. Hopefully, together with the rest of the research team, we have balanced the reflexivity of the data analysis process and strengthened the rigour of the research process, enabling us to gain deeper access to data describing the life-worlds of these ‘busy bees’ training for and competing in endurance sports.

For numerous reasons, we encourage researchers to employ similar methodological approaches for studying the meaning-making of competitive recreational athlete mothers in their life fulfillment. Such collaborative and respectful research approaches may help to affirm and refine the core components of what it means for these women to flourish in competitive recreational sport. In addition, to further expand knowledge gained from the present study, it could be useful for future research to adopt in-depth interpretative interviews, focus group interviews, and longitudinal study designs, with the goal of promoting PWB and fulfillment in the lives of competitive recreational athlete mothers in endurance sports in Scandinavia or even in all the Nordic countries.

Conclusion

Our research supports the larger body of literature on the importance for competitive recreational athlete mothers’ involvement and participation in sport (e.g. Bean and Wimbs 2021, McGannon and McMahon 2021, McGannon, McMahon, and Gonsalves 2018, McGannon, Tatarnic, and McMahon 2019). Hence, the findings of the present study revealed that the participants, who all were mothers, wives, employees, and participants in demanding endurance sports, balanced, juggled, and negotiated their frantic lives to conform to the demands and images of established modern women in advanced Western societies. Despite that the Norwegian cultural context may be considered as equal and women’s rights are internalised in some societal minorities there are still some critical voices raised against competitive recreational athlete mothers’ prioritisation in today’s society. In fact, our findings revealed that even some of the competitive recreational athlete mothers had little support nor any acceptance from their spouses when training and competing in endurance sports. However, while results from the current study suggest that the participants ignored social stigmatising when accessing endurance sport competitions, it is also apparent that many competitive recreational athlete mothers may face similar constraints.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Bjørn Tore Johansen

Bjørn Tore Johansen, PhD, is a professor of sports science at the University of Agder, Department of Sports Science and Physical Education, Faculty of Health and Sports Science. His teaching and research areas are sports psychology, sports pedagogy, and teaching methods with particular emphasis on the role of referee in handball and football, experiences in physical education and qualitative methods. He is a member of the research group ROPE (Research in Outdoor and Physical Education) and the research group SPADE (Sport Performance and Athlete Development Environments).

Eileen Sunde Nordnes

Eileen Nordnes Sunde, MSc, has a master's in sports psychology with an emphasis on health psychology related to training in female athletes. At the moment, she works as Head of Department for Staff and Support in the Norwegian Labor and Welfare Department.

Bård Erlend Solstad

Bård Erlend Solstad, PhD, is an Associate Professor in sports science in the Department of Sport Science and Physical Education at the University of Agder (Norway). He is also the President of the Norwegian association for sports psychology. His academic work centres around research on female athletes, young athletes' experiences and participation in organised sports, as well as quantitative and qualitative methodology. He is also working as a sport psychology consultant with young athletes in Norway.