Declare Yourself Free

This is not another post about the emotional load on moms, or more alarm bells about lack of social support, safety net and the 2.5 million women who left the workforce over the pandemic to hold their households and families together. We know all of that. We read it, worry about it and live it every day. 

This is a call to arms. It’s time to finally put our collective foot down and say that we demand more. 

Willow was built because we wanted to solve a real problem for moms. Pumping, well, sucked. And nobody really seemed to care that it sucked. Traditional pumps literally tie new moms down for hours to a wall. In fact, in their first year of motherhood, moms spend an average of 240 hours or 6 full work weeks plugged into a wall 

And traditional pumps anchor moms down emotionally, too. They’re humiliatingly loud, dehumanizing, archaic, clunky machines designed without a single consideration for what’s best for mom.  The traditional experience of pumping is just the beginning of an accumulation of indignities for new mothers in a society that lionizes motherhood and claims to value families so dearly, but doesn’t support or value them in meaningful ways. 

With Willow, moms are claiming back their freedom, their identity, and their dignity. I'm inspired by Tenaya Taylor, Ashlyn Harris and all of the other mothers out there who are speaking up and changing the narrative about what motherhood looks like, and what mothers can accomplish in addition to building their families. 

At Willow, we’re working on more products to help moms, and doing so with business practices that support working families. It’s a starting point. But there’s so much work to do.  Today, let’s commit to breaking the cycle and to finding opportunities for real change. When we lift up mothers, we lift up our whole community. 

I declare myself free of the stereotypes of what a working mom should be.

I declare that we can make this a better world for moms. What’s your declaration? Join us #withWillow.