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Introduction: Women should have their rights to become mothers regardless of their health conditions. The literature suggests that HIV-positive mothers want to become a mother but encounter many difficulties. However, little is known about the meaning of motherhood among southern Thai women living with HIV. This paper explores the perception of motherhood among these mothers. Methods: Semi-structured in-depth interviewing and drawing methods were combined to collect data from 30 HIV-positive mothers. Thematic method was employed to analyse the data. Results: Three themes were constructed from data analysis: 1) meaning of motherhood and desire to have children, 2) what makes women to be more confidence to have more children, and 3) the importance of children: A social capital value. Motherhood was perceived as an important role in producing children for the future of society and they desired to have children because becoming a mother signified their womanhood. Having a child could fulfill their married life as the child would nourish their relationship as a couple and provide social support for them. They were confident that their children would have high chance of survival rate because of the advanced modern medical care they had access to. Mothers strictly followed the advice and kept appointments to help reduce the chance of HIV transmission to babies. Conclusion: Children were seen as social capital to HIV-positive mothers and thus had a special meaning to them. However, the desire and the rights to become a mother among Thai HIV-positive mothers were common and deserved greater attention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the ways Thai transgender women are affected by internalized, perceived, vicarious and enacted stigma. Participants were eleven Thai transgender women living with HIV, who were asked about experiences of stigma in their daily lives. Various forms of verbal, psychological and physical harassment were reported. Internalized stigma and stigma within the transgender community itself were significant. Participants tended not to blame their family members or others in their social structure for their experiences of stigma. They tended to see the solution to tackle the problem of stigma mainly in changes in the behavior of transgender women themselves. This paper suggests that transgender people themselves should better understand how the structure, culture and institutions of mainstream society instill, reinforce and perpetuate stigma against, within and among them. There is a need for advocacy directed toward manifesting societal emancipation of Thai transgender people—starting with legal reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]