ABSTRACT
This chapter describes a research project carried out while studying for an MSc in Family Therapy. The authors' story about the project, which set out to examine developing mother-child relationships in a neonatal intensive care unit, will include an account of some of its many contexts, both personal and theoretical. It considers the issue of 'systemic' research and, addresses the use of narrative as a research tool as well as presenting themes from the narratives of mothers of special care babies. Postmodernism is difficult to define. At its simplest, the term refers to the embracing of a 'new science' perspective, namely the idea that all 'knowledge' is relational. Narrative is also hard to define. The valuing of qualitative research methods is an example of the 'renegotiation' of meaning in the context of both postmodern and gender-sensitive perspectives.
