Along with social, political, gender, ethical transformations, and even within social structures and dynamics or aesthetics and the experiences lived by human beings, technological evolution has also changed the way in which motherhood is perceived and exercised, representing in many cases a much more comprehensive and bearable task.
Although also, in many cases in an ecosystem that can be confusing and overwhelming.
In this sense, the idea of progress and development is often positioned as the main driver of these changes, although the disparity of contexts and more immediate realities tell us about different ways of mothering, raising, protecting and educating children.
And although cryogenic technologies such as egg freezing or embryo storage, along with improvements in certain health sectors, have provided some ease and freedom when it comes to being mothers, paradoxically, uncertainty and geopolitical complexities, The pair of perspectives around natural resources are factors of incidence within family planning.
However, on a day-to-day basis, being a mother maintains an essence and particularity that is distinguished in each case, breaking most of the time the prevailing molds, traditions and canons.
Erika Rivadeneyra, Daniela de la Rosa and Estephanie Suárez, all young and new mothers, share with us a brief portrait of what today's mother is like, what are the benefits and adversities that the time they had to live presents them, many times not exempt of a battle against entrenched and inoperative visions and traditions, but always with love and maternal intuition ahead.
For the 32-year-old journalist and mother Estephanie Suárez, mobile technology and the Internet were decisive after the days following the birth of her son, who came into the world in the midst of a pandemic, in December 2020.
“The process was strange because with Covid you had to take care of yourself three times.
I didn't go out at all, if I had to buy a supermarket or what I needed daily, my family supported me to go out and buy it.
I was alone for the entire part of the pregnancy, without my baby's father, and this made it a little more complicated, especially going to the doctor, which was in Uber to avoid contagion and everything was hermetic," says Estephanie, who also had to make a break with his upbringing in fields like medicine, recognizing that the home remedies he grew up with didn't always help and inevitably brought him back to the doctor.
One of the battles that Daniela de la Rosa, a 33-year-old mother, had to wage was experienced within her work.
“In my past job, before the pandemic began, I raised my hand to advocate for more days of remote work (they already gave us one a month) and they told me no, because the mothers who were in the company did not give them lack.
This, I think, shows that many times we do not understand that each mother is a world, since those mothers who were talking to me had a car and lived in Santa Fe, which is where my work was located and I lived much further away.
All maternities are different, ”she assures.
On the contrary, Estephanie Suárez assures that the historical fight for gender equality marked a before and after in how her mother experienced motherhood in the workplace, compared to her own experience.
“The inclusion part at work has benefited me.
I was born when my mother worked, and at that time there were a lot of barriers: 'You have children, we can't hire you', or 'I don't know how you do it but you don't have anyone to cover your position'.
In that aspect, I have had an openness from the places where I have worked, both in terms of flexibility within the work dynamics or the facilities to take care of it.
For example, the nursery, before there was that service but it was much more selective, now we have no problem getting it, ”confesses Luciano's mother, her baby.
An unusual strength, the greatest lesson
Despite living in an interconnected ecosystem, with a reconfigured support network and information and technological resources at the service of new motherhoods, today's mothers have not been exempt from the complexities, ailments and discomforts that accompany this life experience, in where the point in common is the discovery of a strength and solution capacities that seemed unthinkable before, while greater independence has been developed to raise in a healthier way, as well as a sense of community away from the individualism that shelters our time. .
“I have had generational clashes, because at my daughter's age they did everything to me, I was very spoiled.
And not my daughter, her therapists strongly ask me to leave her alone to do her things.
I didn't know the level of strength she had until I had my daughter hospitalized and I tried to understand what was happening to her to get down to work.
That discovery is embracing.
And at the end of the day I have also understood that she came to teach me and not the other way around, as is often thought.
But guiding someone from values close to love will always have something positive to give”, confesses Daniela de la Rosa.
For her part, Erika Rivadeneyra has risked and tested, including fears and uncertainties, doubts that she is doing the right thing.
“I discovered that I am stronger than I thought;
I would dare to say that for any woman, being a mother is a total reconfiguration, like being born again.
For example, in the park I saw that the smallest children, even with their fragile bodies, fell.
And the mothers ran terrified, I discovered that the child was not crying because of the fall itself, but because of the mother's scream and fright, that made me learn to control myself and wait to see my son's reaction.
If there's no blood or broken bones, I don't run.
And those are things that you yourself are 'inventing'.
And in other aspects I did feel helpless and waited for my partner to come home from work to give the child a while and share my anguish, while I did my things.
That strength that Daniela and Erika talk about is also shared by Estephanie.
“I learned to see the capacity that she had as a person, she came to triple.
Until you have a child you are not aware of this part that everyone talks about, that it is an inexplicable love;
is a person who is always there with you and loves you above all things.
I think that that generation that grew up with separated parents, a little careless... contrary to that, having a child that you waited for, that you love and that you enjoy makes all the difference, it is one of the best things I can experience, ”says Estephanie Suárez.
That counterpart of the difficulties, the uncertainties that abound in the world, or the shortcomings of its most immediate reality has not stopped the love, fascination and natural drive to be a mother.
And although it is not the same for everyone, the ground to learn more about the world and about themselves is still a living and noble ground.
As Erika Rivadeneyra points out, “being a mother can turn off your ego and that makes you see life from another angle, a much more loving one, which has more to do with sharing.
I like to teach León (her son) the things that I know and I think can amaze him.
That's so cool.
And the fact that your problems go to the background also has something positive, especially in these times that we live very self-absorbed, even in the same networks where everything is 'me, me, me';
it's all about one.