Buen día mi gente, and welcome to La Vida Más Chévere de Childfree Latinas, the only Spanglish podcast for childfree Latinas y Latines, helping us liberate ourselves from the toxic cultural brainwashing we all grew up with so that we can design our best lives instead. I'm your host and resident childfree Latina, Paulette Erato. In part two of my interview with TikTok sensation and childfree Latina, Yoreim Virella, we're picking up where we left off on last week's episode. So if you haven't heard it, you might want to listen to that one first. Yoreim was about to add some nuance to the conversation about how little support there is for motherhood in our society, from postpartum depression to parental leave. That's right. Two childfree women are advocating for mothers in this episode. Like I say all the time, parents and childfree people are not enemies. That's a false divide. We're members of the same global village. We each have something to offer. But that phrase, it takes a village, isn't what a lot of people think it is. It sure as hell doesn't mean that you're freely entitled to a childfree person's time and energy simply because they don't have kids. That's just one of the problems that our society has created. We've also been stripped of our empathy, that thing that makes us connected humans, by focusing so much on individualism. Think about it for a minute. It's all about the I'll get mine and fuck you mentality. That's not great. So, continuing on the thread of motherhood, religion, and conservative values, we're also deconstructing the hot new social media darling, the tradwife aesthetic. Something critical that I missed when we were talking about tradwives, but thankfully picked up in the edit, is that these aesthetic tradwife videos rarely ever have the woman speaking directly to you, only in voiceovers. Because she's not allowed to speak. She's not allowed to have an opinion. She's not allowed to get angry. They're like Stepford wives in tradwife clothing. And these soft life aesthetic videos are luring young people into thinking that the quote unquote traditional life of a wife and mother is easy. It's propaganda is what it is. Spoiler alert! If you really want to have a soft life, you need to work on yourself first, and that's not necessarily easy. But I can tell you, it is worth it. All that and the damage that the lack of self awareness, hustle culture, and a bunch of other toxic social ills are doing to all of us is in this episode. Plus, to lighten it up, a little peek into the divide between childfree pet owners and childfree non pet owners. It's a treat. Let's get into it. Oh my God. Yes. I mean, everything you're saying. This is like topics that I'm very passionate about and I agree 100%. I do want to add to the discourse that I do feel that obviously there's a choice that you make, right? Like before becoming a parent and it's important for you to do the work and have the deeper conversations like you mentioned. I do feel the way we live, especially here in the U. S. and I'm going to just concentrate here because it's where we live, right? Okay. But, because we are in a culture of busyness, and everything is so fast paced, people literally don't have the time to sit down, that's what I've seen, to sit down and actually consciously decide this is what I have to do. Because a lot of communities are in survival mode because this culture wants that to happen. So I think that's one of the things I tend to say a lot in my videos is like, this is conscious work and we don't live in a conscious society. Because it does require a level of depthness that people don't want to go there. It can be scary. There's a lot of conflict. Sitting down with yourself, being okay with being alone, people don't like that. Weirdly enough, like, I absolutely love sitting down, reading a good book, and having a good conversation. But people are scared of having time for themselves. So there's a lot of codependency happening. They want to be surrounded with noise and they don't want to think, that's what's going on. So I think that definitely contributes to this mentality of like well I'll have kids and I'm not going to think it through and I turn out well. But you didn't. Self awareness. We lack self awareness. So it is, it's almost what, like 80 percent of people lack self awareness or read somewhere. That's crazy. That's like a really high number. We are biological wired in a way to have kids. So kids are not an achievement. Like anyone can have kids. Now, raising a person, like you mentioned, who is a well rounded individual to contribute to society, that's an achievement by itself. And it takes a lot of work. So it's, it's interesting how people just feel like having a kid is just trivial. And the thing is, another thing that you touch on, you have this people, wounded people, having children, and it's becomes this competition and abuse and this instability at home. And who are the ones who need to deal with that in society? It's us. The rest of us. Like, we as citizens, we literally have to fix this in a way, right? But they don't take accountability, they think their kids turn out right, but they're like robbing and doing other crap. You know what I mean? So it's just, it's like, oh, I'll do this, I'll have my little kids, and then like they can do whatever, and then we are the ones who need to deal with everything, like everything else. So that's why, to be a parent, there has to be conscious work to happen, right? Because there has to be a consideration of others also in the community when you bring a child here. So, yeah, I agree with you. What's so interesting, as you were saying all of this, I realized that phrase, it takes a village. So many people throw that around as a way of claiming entitlement to other people's time and energy. But at the same time, the village is made up of all of us. The village exists so that we can all depend on one another. And that requires empathy, which I don't think we have. It's so hard because our society, again, without social safety nets, without resources for families, for parents, for mothers, It has been stripped. It is socially acceptable to not be empathetic. Yes. Which is stripping yourself of your humanity. And that's gross. What kind of ridiculous backwards thinking is that? I'm out to get mine, but I want your village. Let's all just go become Genghis Khan then. Just go storming through and taking whatever the fuck we want. Right, right. It's a very individualistic way of thinking and entitlement, like you mentioned. It's just pervasive and it's so normalized in our culture because of the economics and the type of culture we live in. Like we live in a very capitalistic society that competition indivisualism is what's on top and is what is rewarded. And entitlement. So like you mentioned, the village is about society as a whole. Safety nets are a must in this aspect. It's interesting. I'm going to say this because obviously this culture revolves around patriarchy and capitalism. And I feel like we keep saying, Oh, well, you're a woman. You have to have children, you know, the declining rates, what's going to happen to us as a society? And I'd like to say this, the U S preaches this in a way like cómo decimos en español, la moral en calzoncillos. Like they want you to do something but at the same time they don't have anything to do with looking for support for mothers. So I almost feel like women even get penalized for having children. Of course they do. Right? When I say this mothers get pissed at me but I'm just saying what I see. So for example, It was a documentary on Netflix, came out like probably four or five years ago, but it was talking about the Black motherhood experience. And the issue with the rising mortality rates for motherhood, which we know is horrible here, and I think American mothers die in childbirth at a higher rate than any other developed country. Any other. And if we factor black and brown mothers, the numbers go even higher. So how is that even possible? When we all want to have babies, but our healthcare system fails mothers, in a way. And then let's not even talk about the raise in postpartum depression, like the stories you hear. But when the woman gets pregnant, everyone celebrates it, the baby showers. We cannot stress the mother. They're developing a baby. Well, everyone steps in. I feel like as a society, everyone steps in. However, when the woman gives birth to the baby, the person who created this life is left in the back burner. And they are literally left to figure things out by themselves. So now it's around the baby only, nothing about the mother. So it speaks about that, the way the society sees a woman as a whole, right? Like there's no prioritization of who we are. And the way they see us it's like we're less than, we're just fulfilling a role. That's all we are. We're here to procreate, bring the babies, and babies become workers. We could talk about even the complexity of that. But even with, and I think this is the one that gets me the most, just because I work in human resources, so I see this a lot, is the lack of workplace accommodations for mothers. So we're talking about parental leave. I know there's been this whole thing with the last years and change of policies. We have some places that provide parental leave, which is great. But it's only three months. We have European countries that give you almost like in a year and a half of parental leave. And even with that policy change that we had at the federal level, still to this day, only 12 percent of employers actually provide parental leave. 12%! When we have a workforce that is built around females. There are more females in the workforce than males right now. So, it's hard to see, and then obviously the inflexibility in schedules, when they need to take care of their babies, and even the lactating rooms for new mothers. Like, there's barely existence of that. And let's not even talk about childcare. The subsidized child care employers, there's almost nonexistence. Child care now costs like a mortgage. It's ridiculous. I had some friends that had a baby, a couple years ago. And I remember when that was like, when the child care prices were going up and their employer used to provide a little bit of subsidize and they had like a really good child care, like for one to four years old, they were already planning to have the baby. They had to put themselves in a waiting list. For three years, before having the di How is that having the baby? Like, how, how is this so... you want people to have babies, but then everything is unaccessible. How is that even possible? It's sad to see. It's honestly so sad to see, and I refuse to participate in a system that sees me as less than. And I feel bad of all the people that have, and there are people that have told me, with their children and all that, that they love very much, but they're like, If I knew If this was going to be like this, I would have not had children. But they can't say that out loud because then the attacks come, you know how that is. Yeah. And I, I've said this many times on this show and other people's shows, I really appreciate when people are honest and say all of the taboo things. Our existence is already taboo. We are pitted against parents in this false dichotomy and I have family who have children. Those children are important to me. We're a village. And so those parents are not my enemies. We're not, that's just so dumb. So getting past that, but at the same time, have the baby, you get the status, but then you get zero support from our society. And God forbid, if you're not wealthy enough to afford to be able to take all that time off. Three months to raise a child. But they can't go to school for four years. So, what are we supposed to do with this new person? Who we need in society because society demands more laborers. But for the first four years of their life, their parents, if they're lucky enough to work in one of those 12 percent of companies, great. They may have a little bit more support, but come on. Like I said, it's setting people up for failure and it's just, it's disgusting. I don't see how people don't see this. And I don't see how we haven't rebelled against this. Obviously we're trying to do our part here, but at the same time, we can only move the needle so much. If you want to be quite honest, the reason that they keep rolling back these decisions like Roe versus Wade and whatever comes next is because they want us to remain stupid and poor. So that all we do is make babies. So that they have more workers. I mean, come on. It's so freaking clear. The agenda is right there. The agenda is very obvious. But back to what we were saying about parents saying the taboo things. There's a subreddit called Regretful Parents, and it is so sad to read through this, and most of the time I see it reposted to other places where it's like the protagonist, the person who posted it is deemed the devil, right, like am I the devil? And I think the problem with that is because someone admits, I didn't want to do this, I don't want to do it anymore. They are morally broken, they are morally bankrupt. But we set them up for failure. And if we had a little bit more empathy, maybe, maybe we would see what's really going on there is that they thought they knew what they were getting into going into it, but they didn't because the reality is so much more difficult. And you don't get support because no one has empathy because everybody's just trying to get their own and fuck you, I've got mine. That's exactly it, but remember, it's a societal, it's a It's a systemic problem. Yes, it's a systemic problem for sure. We have been conditioned to be this way. Like we were discussing before and we actually took the time to kind of take a step back and reflect and connect with one another, it will be a different story. Obviously, we have all this going on with women's rights and abortion rights and it's really, really scary because we're pretty much trying to go back in time. And this is gonna be a fight that we're gonna be fighting for some time. That's how I feel. However, I think there is almost like this awakening. I know this sounds like, I try to not use this word because it sounds a little too mystical and too out there, but I do believe there's this type of awakening that people are seeing agendas a little bit more clear. And that's why you see more people really taking up space, in order to talk about these conversations, in order to put taboo subjects out there, to really empower women to make the right decisions. However, we also see this counter movement with the trad wives and this romanticization. I know. Uh, uh, uh. I have made and deleted so many reels and videos about the trad wife lifestyle, how it's just a front for conservative values. I'm doing air quotes here because that's bullshit. And I am never in the right headspace for what the effect is going to be after. I'm going to be putting myself into a debate. And I don't have the mental space for that. I don't have the emotional bandwidth for it, but I have very strong feelings about it because it pisses me off because it's selling, it's selling a lie. It is selling a lie. That's the agenda. And also I get where you're coming from because that's one of the reasons I'm very passionate about policy and changes and this type of work. However, you don't see me even though I might do videos here and there right in my account talking about certain things. I try my best to stay out of politics. Because of that. Because I don't want to fall into this lion's den because we live in so polarized world that the armies are from both sides. So I'm like, do I really have that mental capacity like you said, like, can I take this? Because when you put a video out there, it's like you're taking a stand. And it's just, you have to rethink about how that will be impacted, and I feel like the, the energy out there is so wild and unstable. And toxic! Yes, very toxic. Yeah, but the tradwife things, it's definitely an agenda for conservative values, and there's a recruitment for a lot of religious groups doing this. They discovered that social media is a power tool, and they're doing this aesthetic, and I think I've said this in one of my videos. There was one time that I talk about, the aesthetic influencer, there has been this rise of aesthetics and beauty of like the tradwife. Because in a sense you cannot show your values. You cannot because you're not speaking your opinions, right? So you just see the beauty and the organization and that lures people in and it's just like subconsciously changes the shape of like, oh, that looks so easy. And I've seen comments in these tradwives accounts are like, oh my god, you make motherhood look so beautiful. I'm like, that's exactly what they're trying to do. Yes, they're selling you something. It's so crazy, but definitely, it's right there. A lot of people go to social media to escape. So I know that's where their attraction from tradwives comes from, because they're very good with strategy. They're smart as hell with strategy and how to subconsciously shape these people, especially the young folks. I'm a little concerned about the young Latinas right now, because there's this women empowerment movement, and then also trying to bring them back this soft life. Which also has to do with conservative values. Yeah, so there's a lot of agendas happening right now. You know what, Yoreim? I bet you we could make an argument that we have soft lives. We do. Actually yeah, we do. We do. Because my life has one less complication in it for every child I don't have. I don't even have pets. And I know that, okay, in the childfree community, that is a status symbol. That's so true. Are you calling us out? What's going on? No, I'm just saying it's fine if you have pets. Just like I said, it's fine if you have kids. It doesn't negatively impact me. You know what I'm saying? It's like, even within the childfree space, I'm still an anomaly. Right, right. That's true, because you saw me, and I can call myself out. I was like, oh, you have pets? Why would I even just think, like, everyone has pets, all right? Like, why would I think that? But you see, that's why I say that you have to be willing to call yourself out, because we all have stereotypes and biases and subconscious things that just come out. And when it comes out, you're like, Whoa, like why would, what? And it's great that you can check yourself because that requires self awareness, right? Which is not something we teach to people. This is something you have to learn on your own. And that shit's hard. It is hard when you don't have a guide post, a roadmap. How, how do I become aware of what I want when I don't know what I want? We'll start with what you don't want. That's one tactic. I mean, I determined really early on that... I didn't meet my husband until I was 34. So both my brothers had kids by that point. And I was like, okay, I'm just going to be the cool aunt. I'm going to be the titi. And I was really happy being single and the titi. I had time. I had my own money. I had my own space. And then he came along and. If my life had gone in a different direction, I hope I would have still been happy, because I was happy. I was a full human being by myself. And then along came my person, like you were describing your husband. I think it's also an example of we get to change as people. We get to grow. At the end of the day, regardless of whether or not you have children, I hope you are working on yourself. Yes. So that you become self aware and can then pass that on to your sphere of influence, whether that be your children or your friends and whatever. Absolutely. I think that's the key of living a very good life. Learning about yourself, loving yourself and self awareness. And I know there's this movement with the healing thing and I've been in a healing journey myself. I think we will never be healed from things, but the idea is to become better humans than we've been before, right? Like just a little bit in understanding. I think it's important to be very honest with yourself when life changes. Uh, and sometimes you might be very stuck in something and you're obsessed with it and that's like something happens that it changed your perspective. And that's growth and that's what makes us evolve and be better human beings. So, for me, it's always been interesting when, when a lot of people say, oh, I love this person because they've been exactly the same way since they've been 12. I'm like, I mean, I don't think that's good, though. No, I, the person who I was at 12 didn't know anything about the world. I mean, come on. Now, there's another side to that. We could put it in a positive light where. They were always a good person. They shined their light on others and they have continued that into adulthood. Okay, great. That's an example. That's not the only example of being a good person. But I am NOT who I was at 12. I'm not who I was at 34 when I met my husband. And I am proud of the woman that I am today. I'm proud of the person I was in each of those eras, and maybe I've done things in my past that I'm not proud of, but I have grown and I have changed and I have become better. Right. And I'm hoping that we're all doing that, but you're right, all too often, we don't make the time because life is just constant hustle. Yeah. And you get stuck in the loop and like I said, you really have to deconstruct and really be conscious and really put the intention of like, wait, why am I getting looped into it? I used to be like that all the time and I think that's the reason I'm very aware of it and I use it for myself, to check myself. I used to be so busy. If you live in cities, life is like, everyone is doing 500 things at the same time. It's like, if you're not busy, what are you doing? It's just this mentality here in the US. And I used to be busy, and I used to be traveling all the time, and it was always something to do. And then I never had time to do the things I always wanted to do, like create, or just be creative and just be myself. And when 2020 came, that was a collective awakening for everyone, I think. There was a lot of bad things that happened, and we were traumatized collectively, and we're still dealing with that. A lot of people don't understand this, but we are. We also had time to reflect on how we wanted to live our lives. And that was for me, the very key moment when I said, okay, so I always been a creative, I always wanted to do all this stuff, but I'm so busy with work and travel. Even though I love traveling, I didn't have time to be alone and do stuff that I wanted to do forever. And that was my turning point. So I feel like 2020 really was a turning point for a lot of people on a global scale. And I think we are more conscious of it, although we still have a lot of work to do. And, but I sometimes catch myself. I have to catch myself, especially with work and everything. I'm like, no, Yoreim, you have to prioritize. And I have to prioritize rest, for my health, and I really have to prioritize creativity. And that's the reason I do my videos and all that, because that fulfills me. You know what I mean? That lights me up, just talking, just being silly and stupid. That actually, like, it's good for me, like, for my heart. Does that make sense? That's probably why you're so successful at it, because you enjoy it. I do enjoy it, for sure. Yeah, and it's obvious you do. And I, I enjoy watching them. I am in your audience. All the things you're saying about creativity, that's how this podcast started. It started as a way to help people find their creative light, their creative force, their, their, just their creativity. Because our society, again, once again, we're talking about toxic cultural norms, kills it for us. So many adults walk around thinking, I'm not creative. Because that's seen as less than, and that's so diminishing of one's potential. But again, if it doesn't serve the patriarchy. And the profits too! The idea that everything has to be monetized and nothing can just be for you, it's a hustle culture. And hustle culture is toxic. End of story. However, I do understand you and I are speaking from a point of privilege that some people have to hustle to make ends meet. And that is a completely different thing. That's true. That is a completely different thing. And I want to make sure that we delineate that. Absolutely. So I'm happy that you are embracing your creativity and doing all the things because I feel like you mentioned people get very, very stuck and there's a necessity of making money in this culture. And it's for survival. And it's sad because a lot of people don't have the privilege of leisure time because leisure time is a freaking privilege. And that's something that I struggle with sometimes because when I talk with people that are really in this loop of surviving, I obviously comes with this perspective like do this or take one hour here and sometimes they don't even have an hour. And I have to check myself because we are, all of us are living in different planets, in a sense, inside the U. S. Which is the saddest thing that I've seen in a long time. And I wish we can do more, but I appreciate to see so many women coming out embracing and talking about creativity and burnout and the importance of rest and self love because I think there's an interconnection with that. And we might come up with solutions for, for everyone. So I applaud you for that. Thank you. Thank you. I did want to talk about how you have found your community and connection in the childfree space. You mentioned that you're the only one in your family. So how did you create that for yourself? I'm part of different types of communities that feed different aspects of myself. That's the part I think that has really helped me really feel connected and it doesn't need to be one group. It's just I do, like everyone in the world, we have different identities and things that we really enjoy doing. So I'm part of a creative group. I'm part of an entrepreneur group. I'm part of various spiritual communities because spirituality and resting and decolonization work is very important for me. It just makes me feel like I have this purpose of creating the social impact like I had mentioned before. So it's important to feed that aspect of myself and I'm in different parts of that. I have not, however, found yet a childfree community around the DMV area, but I'm on a hunt to find something. And also for me, my friends are family. Because even though I do have, I have a very small family, in a sense that I just have my sister and my mom and I'm not really close with my dad. So my family was very small from the get go and my husband's family is kind of small too, in a way. So I'm connected but because It's such a small family, I'm more connected with my friends. So I see, that's the reason I see my friends as family and I'm very picky with the people I have around me. I try to nourish those relationships constantly and I do prioritize my friendships and my life because that's where I feel connected and fulfilled and joyful and also being part of different things. That's the way I've found it. I've found them in different ways, virtually, in physical, like in physical groups, and I like to test things out. So, I've been part of different ones, but if they don't work, I bounce out. If this is not bringing me joy, or it feels a little off, I'm bouncing out and I'm finding another one. But right now, I'm like in four or five groups that I feel like they're good, and it makes me feel like I'm connected to the ecosystem, if that makes sense. I think that's wonderful, and it really speaks to what I was trying to accomplish with Non-Mom May, that you were number 20 on, were you? I think so. Yeah. And I'm just trying to bring together women who don't have children. Because not everybody that's childfree started there. Some people had to go through a painful journey to get there, and to the other side. And then learn that there was freedom there that they hadn't recognized, and they could still create a thriving life. And so that's what that community has meant for me. So I'm really grateful to have women like you be a part of that, and stand up and take a stand and say, I can do this, you can do this too. I think that's really special and multiple communities are important because when you put all of your eggs in one basket, it limits the diversity of the things that you get to feel and experience. The older you get, the more important that becomes, I think, too, because making friends gets harder. It becomes a part time job, I've seen it set at, and, and that really hit. I was like, yeah, it takes work, and not all of us have the time or energy. But the people that we end up caring for, that we lock in with, that does become a secondary family, but that can't be the only thing. We were brought up as children to then create our own families, right? That is still part of the societal path because we are pack animals, as humans. Yes, our country pushes individualism really hard, but at the end of the day, people need people. And so finding your people based on various interests and likes. And recognizing when one, even though you may have enjoyed it at a time no longer serves you or it becomes a chore, that self awareness is really important, and it's a sign of maturity. It's so important. So important. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for being here. We should do this again. Where can people find you? We'll have this all in the show notes. TikTok is my biggest platform, at Yor Latina Wellness. And Instagram. I'm not a fan of Instagram, sorry. But yeah, you can find me there. At Yor Latina Wellness as well. Fantastic, TikTok, because that's where she is a sensation. That's where you see my unhinged, more unhinged side, more than Instagram. You know what it's showing is that you're really comfortable with yourself, and that's a really great role model to have. So, thank you for being my role model and thank you for being on the show. Well, thank you so much for having me. This conversation was great and this is a burrito. Hey, mira, if this episode made you feel some kind of way, dígame. Dm me on Instagram, or send me a text. You can do that right from your phone. If you want to be a guest on the show and put your story out there too, check out the guest form on my website at pauletterato. com slash guest. Yep, just my name, pauletterato. com slash guest. Y no se te olvide que hay más perks when you join the newsletter. Todos estos links están en los show notes. Muchísimas gracias for your support y hasta la próxima vez, cuídate bien.