A Double Bind of Relational Care: Nurses’ Narratives of Caregiving at Work and at Home

Gender scholars emphasize that care work can be rewarding and quite taxing. Research suggests that neoliberal cuts to health care result in short staffing, higher patient loads, and increased work hours for nurses. Yet few studies ask nurses themselves about their work environments, including their lived experiences of relational care labor. Three themes emerge from in-depth interviews of 26 mothers in nursing jobs: lack of control over work hours, insufficient time for relational care on the job, and work stress complicating caregiving at home. In this sample, fewer than one-third of RN/LPNs have full control over their work schedules. While all respondents highly value their relational care work with patients, all but three report chronic understaffing in their jobs, which constrains relational care labor with patients. Understaffing, combined with long shifts and required overtime, creates job stress that also impinges on nurses’ relational care labor with their children. Thus, most nurses in this sample—particularly single mothers—experience a double bind of relational care. The paper concludes with the implications of these findings for the gender, care work, and work-family conflict literatures.