Role:
UX Researcher, Workshop Facilitator
(4-person team – collaborative project)
Timeline:
1 month (Nov 2021)
Tools:
and laser cutter
Helping New Parents Talk About Emotions
New parents often go through big emotional changes after birth, but short nurse visits don’t always leave space to talk about it. Many parents don’t know how to start that kind of conversation. We designed a simple conversation tool to help both parents reflect on how they feel and make it easier to open up during nurse check-ins.
We worked with midwifery and nursing students in Denmark. They told us that nurse visits usually focus on physical recovery not emotions. This led us to ask:
How might we help new parents talk more openly about emotions durin nurse visits?
Top Roaming Pain Points
1. Limited time with nurses:
Nurse visits are often short, leaving little time to talk about how parents are really feeling
2. Hard to talk about negative feelings:
Many parents find it hard to bring up difficult emotions, especially during quick check-ins.
3. Partners feel left out:
Partners often feel overlooked in the conversation and unsure how to share their own experiences.
Research Methods
Method
Purpose
Interviews with 3 parents
Affinity mapping
Midwifery students workshop (Emotion Wheel)
Nurse students workshop (with Emotional Kits)
Empathy & journey mapping
Role-play observations with design students
Learned about emotional challenges after birth.
Insights to find common emotional themes.
Explored how midwives address emotions
Co-designed support for emotional conversations
Mapped parents' emotions during nurse visits
Evaluated tool through role-play
Key Questions I Explored:
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How can we help new parents reflect on their emotions before a nurse visit?
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What helps nurses recognize when a parent needs emotional support?
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How can we make both parents feel included in emotional conversations?
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​How might we support emotional conversations without adding time to nurse visits?
What I Heard
We spoke to parents and healthcare students to understand emotional struggles after birth. Then, we grouped their quotes into themes to guide our design.
“I didn’t want to sound like I was complaining… but I cried every night.”
“They always ask how the baby is not how I’m doing.”
“I felt guilty that I wasn’t feeling the same joy as last time.”
Affinity Mapping – What We Heard Most
We grouped the quotes into 3 key themes that showed us where parents struggle.
1. Fear of Judgment
2. Not Enough Time
3. Left-Out Partners
“I just said I was fine.”
“I didn’t want to seem like a bad parent.”
“The nurse visit was really short.”
“There wasn’t time to talk about
emotions.”
“They didn’t ask how I was.”
“I wasn’t sure I should speak.”
Insight: Parents hide hard
feelings to avoid being judged.
Insight: Short appointments make it hard to open up.
Insight: Partners often feel
invisible in nurse visits.
Insight
These themes showed us the tool needed to start honest conversations, save time, and include both parents.
Empathy Map – “The First-Time Mom”
We created empathy maps for each interviewee to explore emotional patterns. I chose to highlight the first-time mom, as her experience reflected the most common themes across all three participants.
SAYS
“I’m just tired, I guess.” /
“I should be happy, right?”
FEELS
Overwhelmed, ashamed, unsure
THINKS
“What if this means I’m not a good mom?”
DOES
Smiles through visits, avoids tough topics
Insight
Parents often hold back emotions out of fear of being judged.
Midwife Workshop What We Learned
In the first workshop, students acted out nurse visits using emotion tokens. We noticed how parents (played through personas) often struggled to share emotions. This showed us the tool should:
​
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Be used at home before the visit
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Let both parents reflect and talk privately
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Help nurses spot emotional needs quickly
This showed us the tool needed to feel simple and not too clinical so parents wouldn’t feel judged.
We used Plutchik’s Emotion Wheel to offer a mix of positive and negative feelings without calling them “good” or “bad.” It helped shape the emotion tokens used at home and during nurse visits.
Nurse Students Workshop
After feedback from midwifery students, we updated the prototype to better support postpartum emotions in both parents.
The tool was now designed to be used at home, giving couples time to reflect before the nurse visit — saving time during check-ins.
It included a small box of emotion tokens. Couples picked words that described their week and brought them to the visit. Nurses used these to start conversations and suggest support.
We tested this version with nursing students at Absalon Nursing School. Their feedback was positive — they said it felt simple, realistic, and helpful for emotional check-ins.
Journey Mapping and Mindset Shift
Before mapping the journey, I captured early stakeholder assumptions around pricing and charging behaviour. Then, using real user quotes, emotions, and behaviours, I built a journey map that highlighted the most stressful parts of roaming searching, starting, and trusting the charge. This map helped visualize emotional highs and lows, and became a turning point: it helped the team step into the
user’s shoes and rethink what really matters.
Step
Feeling
Need
Opportunity
At Home
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Tired, unsure, overwhelmed
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Time and space to reflect with partner
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Provide a simple tool parents can use together at home
Before Check-up
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Nervous, anxious
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Help finding the right words
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Let parents choose emotions in advance with prompts
During Check-up
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Guarded, afraid of judgment
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A safe way to open up
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Give nurses a quick view of how parents are feeling
After Check-up
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Mixed, still unsure
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Some follow-up or continued support
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Offer a way to reflect again or bring up missed topics
Insight
Emotional conversations work best when parents prepare in advance before the pressure of a short nurse visit begins.
The Prototype: “Emotion Kit”
Our solution was a physical tool parents could use at home, before the nurse visit.It helps them reflect, talk together, and bring emotional context into the appointment. What’s inside:
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Emotion tokens (words like “tired,” “grateful,” “guilty,” “ashamed”)
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A felt board to map feelings from the week
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Wooden figures for roleplay or storytelling
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Small enough to carry into the check-in
Goal: Help nurses start faster and deeper conversations without needing more time
Delivering Insights & Impact
Our project revealed a critical gap in postnatal care: emotional needs are often overlooked, especially in short nurse visits. Many parents—especially partners—don’t feel seen or heard during these moments. Through interviews, workshops, and role-play testing, we uncovered patterns that shaped both our insights and our final solution.
​
Key Insights Delivered:
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Parents need space to reflect before visits to feel ready to open up.
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Partners feel left out, but want to be included in emotional conversations.
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Fear of judgment prevents honesty during check-ins.
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Nurses don’t need more time—just better emotional cues to start meaningful conversations.
​
Real Impact:
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Our Emotion Kit gave parents a private, low-pressure way to explore their feelings together at home.
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Nurses could start deeper conversations faster, using the emotion tokens as clear emotional signals.
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Partners felt acknowledged and more comfortable participating in check-ins.
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The approach proved realistic and usable within the time limits of existing nurse visits.
This project showed that small, thoughtful tools can create meaningful change in emotional healthcare—by making space for voices that often go unheard.
Reflection
What I Took From This
​
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Parents opened up more easily when using emotion tokens
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Nurses said the tool helped them “start where it matters”
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Partners felt included and heard during check-ins
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Nurses could spot emotional struggles more quickly
What I would do differently
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Talk to real parents, not just role players
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Ask better questions to explore emotional triggers
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Run a short usability test with actual users
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Involve both parents earlier in the research phase
