Between Body, Culture and Identity: Towards an Integrative Psychopathological Model of Hysterectomy in the Cameroonian Context

Abstract

In Cameroon, hysterectomy cannot be understood solely as a surgical procedure intended to treat certain gynaecological conditions. Although it belongs to the medical field, it also carries deep psychological, cultural, social and identity-related meanings. In a context where motherhood, fertility and family continuity play an important role in the social recognition of women, the loss of the uterus may be experienced as a major bodily and symbolic rupture. It may transform women’s relationship with their bodies, weaken their sense of femininity, affect self-esteem, and expose some women to shame, guilt, social withdrawal, conjugal or family rejection, as well as anxious and depressive manifestations. This theoretical article aims to propose an integrative psychopathological analysis of the experience of hysterectomy in the Cameroonian context. It brings together several interpretative frameworks, including the psychodynamic approach, the phenomenological approach, transcultural psychopathology, the community-based approach and logotherapy. This perspective makes it possible to understand hysterectomy as a multidimensional experience in which the lived body, cultural norms, representations of motherhood, religious beliefs, family relationships and the search for meaning contribute both to psychological suffering and to the possibilities of identity reconstruction. The research therefore argues for the need for an integrative psychopathological model capable of guiding both empirical research and clinical care. Such a perspective calls for moving beyond a purely biomedical response in order to provide support that is sensitive to the bodily, psychological, cultural, spiritual and community realities of women who have undergone hysterectomy in Cameroon.