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A Taiwanese Widow’s Journey to Redefine Her Social Identity

The author is a counseling psychologist. When she was forty-five years old, she lost her beloved husband to cancer. The reflective account in this report examines the cultural underpinnings of the challenges that she encountered as she was seeking to redefine her social identity after this traumatic loss. The unspoken norms in a patriarchal tradition thrust her into unexpected confusions and struggles—norms with residues that still permeate modern society in Taiwan. To sort through these conundrums and dilemmas, she turned to autoethnography. After two years of writing, two prominent themes emerged. The first theme centers on the insider/outsider tug-of-war manifested in her interactions with her in-laws. The second pertains to how she is perceived by the society now that her wedded partner has passed away. Is she married? Is she single? Through writing, the sociocultural threads embedded in what she experienced slowly crystallized. She was afforded a more detached vantage point to reflect on her feelings and thoughts and the dimensions that had eluded her before. This enlightenment empowered her and contributed in a meaningful way to moving her forward on her journey to redefine her new identity.