Every second Sunday of May, we honor maternal figures with common gifts of brunches, cards and flowers. While these are thoughtful and sweet gestures, they are ultimately not enough. In an age where reproductive rights are dwindling, public services are being slashed under the Trump administration, family deportations are escalating and mothers are chronically overworked and underpaid, appreciation for maternal figures through gifts feels like a hollow offering. It does not address the systemic issues that impact motherhood, nor the degradation of their humanity under President Trump’s policies.
Motherhood is often praised in an idealized fashion; however, this ideology is dangerous. We are told motherhood is noble, sacred and selfless in the media and in real life, but we are not told how much it costs. We are not told about the endless emotional labor, unpaid domestic work, loneliness, guilt and how the world demands everything from you but offers nothing in return.
Mothers and maternal figures often fall into the gender normative role of housekeepers and managers of emotional crises within the household. They are responsible for scheduling doctors’ appointments, teaching empathy, doing laundry at midnight and somehow are still expected to show up to work like nothing is wrong. Yet, this labor is dismissed as a “natural” instinct or talent. Meanwhile, men are often praised for doing the bare minimum in caregiving, reinforcing a double standard that undervalues the full scope of maternal labor.
Burnout is everywhere, not because mothers are not strong enough, but because they are asked to survive impossible conditions like working two jobs without childcare, healing from giving birth without definitive paid leave or managing a household while navigating chronic stress, and having to smile.
Under President Trump, conditions for mothers are getting worse. Programs that helped working mothers make ends meet, like Women, Infants and Children (WIC) and Head Start, are being cut. Medicaid is being axed while the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is cutting programs deemed “inefficiencies,” including reducing school funding, child care subsidies, public health programs and more. The rollback of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives and the cutting of community-based support programs leave mothers who are Black, brown, queer, disabled or undocumented with even fewer resources — erasing the very systems that aim to level the playing field.
The fact that a woman’s right to choose motherhood is being gutted is downright vomit-inducing. Reproductive healthcare should not be politicized, criminalized or treated like a moral battleground — it is a basic human right. For decades, medical guidelines have recognized that early-stage fetuses, before viability, cannot survive, think or feel pain. They are not yet living, sentient beings. Many of the laws that are now overturned had previously allowed termination precisely because of this scientific truth.
Forcing people to carry unwanted or unsafe pregnancies increases the risk of depression, anxiety and trauma — conditions that can linger long after birth. When reproductive autonomy is stripped away, it doesn’t lead to better mothers; it leads to more women raising children in environments marked by fear, resentment and systemic neglect.
What makes this even more infuriating is the hypocrisy behind these ideas. Lawmakers exist because their mothers had the right to choose. Whether that choice was to become a parent, adopt or end a pregnancy, the decision was theirs. That same freedom of bodily autonomy should not be up for debate now. Every person deserves the dignity of choosing what happens to their own body. Stripping this right away isn’t about morality. It’s about control. And no amount of flowers on Mother’s Day can cover up that injustice.
Then there’s the fear among immigrant mothers who are being detained while picking up their children from school, and entire families are being deported without warning. Some sources, including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and PBS, claim that even children who are U.S. citizens are being deported alongside their foreign-born mothers.
While the White House and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) insist this isn’t happening, it’s hard to take their word at face value when the administration appointed a Homeland Security Secretary known more for loyalty to Trump than for transparency or compassion. The U.S. can’t celebrate motherhood while quietly tearing families apart at the same time. There is absolutely nothing “pro-family” about that.
When I think of everything motherhood demands, I think of my mom, Anna Angel. She doesn’t have the most glamorous job or a big platform as a tax preparer, but she has a strength that most people could not even fathom. Growing up, she worked long hours in multiple jobs to keep food on our table and would come home every day to care for my siblings and grandparents. She battled stage four cancer but never let it stop her from showing up for me, her friends and herself. She did all of this while being a single mother.
She’s lived through serious heartbreaks, health scares and a lifetime of people underestimating her with love. However, love cannot protect her from exhaustion due to hospital bills or being overlooked by a system that treats her like an afterthought. She is more than just a mom, survivor, Chicana and a tax preparer; she is a human being who deserves better than what this country offered her in her hardest MOM-ents. And she isn’t the only one.
So many moms who are single, immigrant, queer, disabled and working-class are forced to raise families in systems not built for their survival. Their struggles aren’t rare — they’re the reality for millions. But because society clings to narrow expectations of what motherhood looks like, these maternal figures are often overlooked, unheard and unsupported. However, like my mom, they deserve to be seen, heard and fought for.
People love to post about how “strong” mothers are. But strength without support is exploitation. You can’t claim to care about mothers and vote against paid family leave. You can’t buy your mom a bouquet and ignore the fact that women are leaving the workforce in droves because child care is unaffordable. You can’t say you love your mom and then stand by as other moms are deported, dismissed or left behind.
The U.S. remains the only industrialized country without guaranteed paid parental leave, and most workers, especially mothers, are left with just 12 weeks of unpaid leave — if they qualify at all. Childcare costs more than college in some states. Medical debt crushes new mothers before their babies can take their first steps. And somehow, the people in power have decided the problem is that moms are demanding too much by asking for time, dignity and a safe place to raise their kids.
This Mother’s Day, I will hopefully get my mom something that can convey how amazing she is by voting, protesting and speaking out for the rights of millions of women and mothers everywhere, like their lives depend on it — because they do. I will speak out against President Trump’s cruel policies that punish caregivers, and I will advocate for universal childcare, paid leave, healthcare access, restoring Title IX, DEI programs and immigration justice.
Mothers don’t need empty praise; they need protection and urgent policy reform. Women and mothers everywhere need a country that values their lives, not just their labor.
So, yes, celebrate your maternal figures by writing them a card, hugging them tight and telling them you love them. But after the brunch ends and the flowers wilt, remember this: If we truly love our mothers, we must build a world where they can thrive, not just survive.
