Undoing Motherhood Prepares to Launch Bold New Framework for Maternal Liberation

VANCOUVER, BC—Undoing Motherhood doesn’t approach motherhood’s pain points—shame, guilt, loneliness, exhaustion, trauma, grief, and sacrifice—the way most cultural or wellness narratives do: by targeting moms with more advice or optimization strategies. Instead, it starts from a radical premise—that the problem isn’t moms, or children, it’s the cultural model of motherhood itself. 

Founder Natasha Coulis, an ex-traditional mom of four now-grown children, believes that most mothers already love their children more fiercely and enduringly than anyone else will. “Moms don’t need more motivational content,” Coulis says. “Their love is already the engine. They already yearn to be the best moms possible more than they even yearn to stay alive. What they need is relief from a system that exploits that love." 

Coulis argues that mothers don’t fail because they aren’t trying hard enough. They fall short because they are trying to thrive within conditions shaped by sexism, racism, queerphobia, transphobia, ableism, fatphobia, and, most significantly, economic insecurity. "You cannot parent effectively while terrified about money," she emphasizes.

Feminist theorists such as Adrienne Rich, Andrea O’Reilly, Silvia Federici, Patricia Hill Collins, Sara Ruddick, Shari L. Thurer, and more, have powerfully analyzed and described how oppressive systems shape motherhood. But in her sociological research studies at UBC, Coulis felt a dimension was still unrecognized. She believes the Western colonial model of motherhood itself is a distinct form of oppression, not fully captured by intersecting marginalized identities. She calls this unique oppressive experience chimeral mother pain—a suffering born from the biological tether to children, the irreversibility of motherhood, the colonial family design, and the cultural expectations that turn moms into extended minds for children and self-erasing machines. She believes even mothers who fit the cultural ideal—rich, white, straight, cisgender, able-bodied, and beautiful—experience chimeral mother pain as a form of oppression; and that when other experiences of societal marginalization are layered on top of chimeral mother pain, the experience can become literal torture. 

Undoing Motherhood names the six most common forms of maternal suffering as The Motherhood Pain Hexad, and offers a revolutionary path forward to "undo" or dismantle our current cultural model of motherhood and redesign it into something healthy and sustainable for mothers and children.

Undoing Motherhood provides:

• Paid, research-based online courses with original theory, frameworks, and tools—redesigned courses coming Summer 2025

• A private, paid community space for support and solidarity—coming Summer 2025

• Free educational content to shift cultural narratives about moms and mothering

Coulis has also introduced a powerful lexicon to help mothers name their experience and reclaim power:

• Mom Gaze: The ever-present, panopticon-like scrutiny of mothers in public and private spaces

• Pain Capital: The moral and social credit assigned (or denied) based on how mothers display their suffering

• Existential Capital: The drive for legacy or symbolic immortality, which can push especially white mothers to uphold harmful ideals of the “Good Mother”

• Futurist Mother: A visionary alternative to the Good Mother ideal—ego-less, liberatory, anti-racist, truth-seeking, and future-facing

Undoing Motherhood and Coulis’s work have already begun to gain media attention. In 2023, she was featured in Upworthy for her viral TikTok advocating that stay-at-home moms negotiate labour contracts to be paid for their unpaid work—a bold call that resonated widely with mothers who feel invisible and financially vulnerable.

Originally founded in 2020, Undoing Motherhood began as a passion project but faced early challenges due to Coulis's then-undiagnosed autism and chronic illnesses—conditions that, like motherhood itself, are often misunderstood or dismissed in medical research. In 2025, the project has found its voice, and is now seeking partnerships with aligned organizations, educators, and creators who are ready to take on the cultural architecture of patriarchy, capitalism, and colonialism—all of which rely on the free labour of mothers.

Coulis envisions a collective movement of educators, researchers, creators, and caregivers aligned around shared values and committed to creating a culture where mothers don’t have to suffer to be "good."

Visit www.undoingmotherhood.com to join the movement.

To learn more about Natasha Coulis, visit: https://www.undoingmotherhood.com/about

For interviews or partnership opportunities, email natasha @ undoingmotherhood.com