Samara Felippo talks about the difficulties of being a single mother: ‘It’s a game, it just changes stages’

Daughter, sister and mother, Samara Felippo, 44, sees motherhood in a practical way and talks about it without mincing words. “Being a mother is a game. We just change stages, you play and die and survive”, she compares in a chat with the F5.

“We bite our tongues too, and do things we said we would never do”, says the carioca, who will celebrate this Mother’s Day with her daughters Alicia, 14, and Lara, 10, fruits of her relationship with the former player basketball player Leandrinho Barbosa. The couple stayed together between 2005 and 2013, but today Samara takes care of the girls alone.

She clarifies that, for her, a single mother is the one who is responsible for the daily care of the children, even if this woman is in a relationship. “A phrase that I always repeat is: a single mother can be married. And the term is ‘single mother’, not ‘single mother’, because my motherhood has nothing to do with my marital status”, she says.

“There are men who go out to work, to grow professionally in their careers, and the mother stays at home alone with all the emotional and psychological demands”, he explains. “But sometimes, this woman remains in that relationship because of financial or emotional dependence.”

Samara says she gave up many dreams to become a mother, but she doesn’t regret it. She says she just thinks it’s unfair that the myth of the “big dad” still exists, an adjective used —many times— to qualify those who only do the basics and, even so, receive a shower of praise.

“It’s an obligation to get along, not only financially, but emotionally,” he says. “We women wear the ‘heroine’ shirt when, in fact, we are exhausted. When I ‘militate’ in my networks and say ‘I love my daughters, but I don’t like being a mother’, I don’t talk about the people not having children. But about people having children with a lot of conscience”, he explains.

Surrounded by a support network, Samara relies on the help of family, friends and her mother, Lea Felippo, who loves her granddaughters. “A woman without a support network is exhausted, overwhelmed, hysterical, dramatic,” she says.

“I am always asked how I had the courage to separate with two daughters. But that was when I managed to see what I no longer wanted for myself. And then I began to appropriate myself. Today, even with friendship, if it is being toxic, if it is me when I get sick, I take it out of my life”, he says. “We were taught to be nice, kind. I came from a very conservative, non-questioning upbringing. Today, I don’t keep anything back, I let everything out.”

With a strong personality, the actress says she is an open book and says, does and wears what she wants. She often discusses with her more than 1 million followers on social networks about solo motherhood, sexuality and politics, among other topics. To the “guesses on duty”, she says she is not bothered by other people’s opinions.

“I’m 45 years old this year”, she recalls, who is still widely remembered for the role of Érica, which she played between 1999 and 2002 in “Malhação” (Globo). Part of the public was surprised when she decided to assume the white locks in her hair. And there are always those who criticize her when she publishes a more sensual photo on social networks.

“I believe that the perfect mother even exists, but she hasn’t had a child yet”, shoots the actress. “This idea of ​​this pure, chaste mother comes to reverberate when I put on the clothes I want and I am judged. And then there is this image that society idealizes, with structural machismo — because when a woman dresses like that, she is ‘vulgar’, is ‘promiscuous’… But we are walking at an ant’s pace.”

For psychoanalyst Val Marquesi, this idealization of motherhood is really dangerous. She advises not to compare yourself with other mothers and evaluates that, with this, a feeling of not feeling worthy or sufficient as a mother may arise (or increase): “Social networks can bring a lot of damage to mental health”.

“It is important to read and study, but the most important thing is that the mother learns to connect with her child”, he says. “It’s listening to experiences, but trying to filter. Because what works for one mother, doesn’t work for another. I think the worst thing for the mother is the comparison. The networks are just a nice cut of the person’s life and do not represent the whole. So it’s cruel to compare yourself. I dare say that the comparison is worse than the excess of information.”

Comparison, by the way, is a theme that Samara always tries to bring to her networks. The actress says that she receives many outbursts and thanks through her profiles. “This desire to speak comes from this huge network of women. I receive reports from women saying that they don’t feel like a monster in motherhood, like: ‘Thank you, you took a ton out of me’, ‘we are silenced all the time’ , ‘you are very real’.”

The actress joined this whirlwind of feelings and outbursts, which culminated in the project of the play “Mulheres Que Nascem com os Filhos”, directed by Rita Elmôr and will be on display at the MorumbiShopping theater (south zone of São Paulo) on the 1st, June 2, 3 and 4. Alongside her friend and actress Carolinie Figueiredo, she says that both wanted to understand the transformations they went through after becoming mothers.

“We idealize childbirth, breastfeeding, the perfect relationship, the perfect mother we want to be. And that’s what we talk about in the play. How to deal with frustration when things go wrong and when we empower ourselves with this motherhood and this woman who he is reborn after his children. They are real stories and a fierce de-romanticization”, he anticipates.