ABSTRACT
Although the literature is replete with references to birth as sacred, a spiritual journey where a new life is welcomed into the world, this is juxtaposed with the almost exclusively medical focus on birth if something should go wrong. Ultrasound screening for foetal anomalies was first introduced into practice more than thirty years ago, and rapid technological developments have meant that women's experience of pregnancy has changed irrevocably. Regularising second trimester ultrasound has created an environment where women attend to seek reassurance of presumed foetal well-being rather than the exclusion or confirmation of foetal abnormality. References to God and the belief in a just world were common in women's narratives. Some described trying to come to terms with the diagnosis as a spiritual struggle as they questioned why God was punishing them when they perceived that they were not responsible for the diagnosis.
