“I belong to nowhere now”: An interpretative phenomenological analysis of Pakistani migrant women’s lived experiences of identity, nostalgia, exclusion and wellbeing in Norway

Womens Health (Lond). 2026 Jan-Dec;22:17455057261484359. doi: 10.1177/17455057261484359. Epub 2026 Sep 6.

ABSTRACT

BackgroundMigrant women’s health and wellbeing are shaped by intersecting structures of gender, race, religion, and postcoloniality. Pakistani migrant women in Norway occupy a particular intersection of these structures, in which collectivistic kinship expectations, patriarchal norms, and postcolonial inheritance interact with Norwegian institutional gatekeeping. Despite a growing Pakistani-origin population in Norway, little qualitative research has examined how the identity work of recent first-generation Pakistani migrant women relates to their psychological and social wellbeing.ObjectivesThis study examined the psychological and social wellbeing implications of identity reconstruction among Pakistani migrant women in Norway, with particular attention to how acculturative challenges, structural exclusion, and gendered nostalgia shape stress, belonging, and adaptation.DesignQualitative study using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) with a postcolonial feminist orientation. The reporting of this study conforms to the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ).MethodsEleven in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with Pakistani migrant women aged 20 or older who had migrated to Norway between 2020 and 2023 and were fluent in Urdu and English. Eight interviews were prioritised for in-depth idiographic IPA case work based on rich, idiographic suitability for analysis, and the remaining three were retained as contextual cases. Informational sufficiency was assessed through ongoing analytic memo-writing. Reflexivity, theory triangulation, and multivocality strengthened methodological rigour.ResultsFive interrelated Group Experiential Themes captured participants’ lived experiences: (1) Resisting and severing gendered expectations, with implications for chronic stress and internalised surveillance; (2) Reconstructing identity in self-exile, with implications for self-efficacy gains and relational isolation; (3) Encountering exclusion in institutions and everyday life, with implications for anxiety, sleep disruption, and stress associated with administrative limbo; (4) Nostalgia, liminality, and limbo, with nostalgia operating as both an emotional regulator and an amplifier of loneliness; and (5) Intergenerational and inter-cohort cultural (dis)identification, with implications for diminished belonging and intra-community alienation.ConclusionIdentity reconstruction among Pakistani migrant women in Norway is a health-relevant process in which structural exclusion, gendered norms, and cultural nostalgia converge to shape stress, belonging, and agency. The Identity Meaning-Making Model offers a recursive framework with direct implications for culturally responsive mental health care and equity-driven integration policy.

PMID:42702058 | DOI:10.1177/17455057261484359