*3.2. The Blessings of Freedom*

One such blessing was participants' freedom to enjoy their babies. A common experience for many mothers was the feeling of freedom from social expectations, including fulfilling the dominant socially constructed roles and identities set before many new moms, as illustrated in the following quote.

COVID has been a blessing and a nightmare for our new family ... [our baby] gets a lot more daddy time every day and I get help during the day if I need it ... I now feel no pressure to be a "super mom". I just focus on spending time with her [baby] and enjoying her baby days. I know if the pandemic hadn't happened, I'd be out doing "mommy and me" classes, doing visits, and generally trying to be more productive.

The requirement for families to stay within their own household was seen as a blessing for many of the participants because it created a sense of freedom from the social expectations placed upon new mothers to engage in "productive", externally-focused activities, like mommy classes, visits from family members and friends, and other activities. Instead of feeling obligated by societal pressures and a cultural discourse of productivity to participate in new mother activities and obligations, several participants were able to find a relief from these pressures.

It is interesting to look at how the participant in the quote above constructed the word 'productivity' outside of the home. This dichotomy has been created through a cultural discourse of productivity that gives more respect to work outside the family or household unit [36]. Parenting has been socially constructed to be less visible and less respected compared to work outside the home, an issue that is highly influenced by the gendered norms within society that also work to devalue emotional labour [36]. This socially constructed meaning about caring for a new baby often leads to unrealistic expectations for mothers to 'do it all' while caring for their children [36]. Previous research has shown that pressures to do the right things, and to be a "super mommy" can add a lot of pressure and stress to the experiences of new motherhood [8,9]. Many of the participants in our study expressed similar experiences of feeling less pressure to have to do it all. One participant said, "I found it great to bond as a family" and another stated "spending a lot of time doing things together ... relaxed and no pressure to go anywhere".
