ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the sociocultural and psychological construct of self-sacrifice, leading to possible masochism in the women of two Eastern societies, India and Japan. It discusses the emotional experience of shame which may often lead to unconsciously inflicting moral pain on the self by the mechanism of hiding. This dual aspect of what is visible and what is hidden and invisible is active in shame as well as in masochism. The chapter explains the treatment of women's identity as mothers and caregivers in the two societies and how it affects them psychologically by generating and nurturing self-sacrificial qualities in them. It illustrates the self-sacrificial qualities of a "good mother"/care-giver, or "altruistic" qualities, in a clinical vignette of a patient who experienced depressive guilt, which may hinder creative explorations in a woman and clinically impact on the emotional wellbeing of women in some Eastern societies.
