Introduction: In recent years research on recovery have resulted in new knowledge and gained relevance in the mental health field. Still recovery is discussed in terms of individual journeys to find ways to live a hopeful and satisfying life. Taking the concept of gender into consideration it is possible to begin to address additional questions about how women and men influence their recovery; how they perceive and understand the society in which they live, and how they are likely to be regarded and treated within that society.
Methods: In a study conducted in Sweden 30 first-person accounts of recovery from mental illness were examined. The study was undertaken to determine if there was gender diversity in what people described as being decisive factors for their recovery.
Results: The results illustrates a gender advantage for the men in their ability to make use of the psychiatric services offered in their coping strategies mainly focusing on remission, education and control over symptoms. The women, on the other hand, described hospitalization and psychiatric medication more in terms of coercion and helplessness. These results may raise the need for a gender perspective in psychiatry to reduce the female impediment to access to safe and effective psychiatric care. But the results also illustrate how gender norms, outside psychiatry, benefit women more than men in a recovery perspective. In spite of structural gender inequalities, female gender norms seemed to be an advantage in the recovery process. The female recovery process was focused on making sense and meaning, whereas the male recovery process was focused on reinforcement of traditional roles such as occupation and independence. The women also had a higher capacity to receive and maintain support from their social networks than did the men.