Mara Martin Believes Millennial Moms Are *It*

In 2018, Mara Martin went viral. It was a different world back then — TikTok wasn’t a thing, Instagram reels weren’t perfectly edited and curated, and going viral meant international levels of recognition. We’re talking interviews with reporters in Australia and segments on everything from local news to Inside Edition and Good Morning America all for Mara’s big moment: walking the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit runway in Miami.

But it crossed more than just hemispheres; this moment crossed a whole lot of societal norms.

Because Mara was breastfeeding her daughter as she walked the runway. Wearing a gold metallic bikini, her long hair down, she took that moment she’d been working towards her whole life and turned into a statement on motherhood, on chasing dreams, and on women being able to have it all.

But that really wasn’t her intention. “I was just feeding her,” she tells me. “It wasn’t this big statement.”

Since then, Mara has continued to be a model, an advocate, and even operates her own PR company, Vyral PR, helping other women find their voice and identity. And even without that viral moment in 2018, she fully believes that chasing her dreams alongside her two daughters is better than doing it on her own. I got the chance to catch up with her and talk about all the things we love most — like being a mom — and how it has completely shifted our mindset on everything else.

Scary Mommy: I need to thank you for being so flexible, I know we’ve had to reschedule this chat a few times because of kid stuff.

Mara Martin: Isn’t it crazy? You were talking about how you feel like your kids haven’t had a full week of school since the holidays, and I’m like, “Oh my God, do they ever?” Even this week, they were off on Monday. We just had a whole spring break. Next week they’re off on Friday. I’m like, “When do they go to school?”

SM: Literally. And even with talking about all the chaos of kids and school, I just have to say that your Instagram really just shows what a joyful mom you are.

MM: Oh my God, thank you.

SM: It’s so nice to see. There’s so much on social media about the dullness of motherhood and the overwhelm, and it’s so fun to see how much you really enjoy it.

MM: I actually do really enjoy being a mom. I actually like being around my kids. In the summer, I don’t put them in any camps. I genuinely enjoy doing things with them. My husband even gets annoyed by it. He’s like, “Can’t we just do something by ourselves?” And I’m like, “I like having them around!”

SM: That’s so funny. I’m the same way.

MM: So yeah, that's basically my life. Even work stuff, I bring them to a lot of my work stuff, too. I'll do runway shows or even interviews, I like to have them see as an example of what I do, and they find joy in it as well. And so, I'm the person that if it doesn't say don't bring your kids, I'm bringing my kids. You might want to put it on the invitation or make it clear beforehand because they're probably going to be there with me.

SM: I mean that’s kind of how your viral moment came, right? You took your baby to the casting call?

MM: In the modeling industry, there's kind of a time limit. You have to make it in your 20s, and that's just what it is. And especially years ago, this was six, seven years ago, and there was this open call casting for the dream brand, like Victoria's Secret, Sports Illustrated. Those are the peak of modeling. And I was like, oh, I've just freshly became a mom, but this opportunity — I've never done this before. And I was just like, I'll just take her. It'll be a typical casting. We'll be in and out. And I got there, and of course I'm the only one with a baby.

SM: Oh, I bet.

MM: And there was 10,000 girls. I remember calling my friend like, “Oh my gosh. I'm going to look so stupid. I had my diaper bag. I didn't even bring a stroller.” And yeah, so I brought her there because I didn't have a babysitter, and I was like, I'm not missing this. And so I brought her, and it kind of really started my whole brand. And the breastfeeding moment, I mean, I love sharing the story because people always assume it was this planned thing and this statement. And I wish it was. I wish I did, like, “Oh my gosh. I'm going to be girl power.” But it almost felt more inspiring in some way that it wasn't planned because it was just the rawness of motherhood. It was just me being backstage, being a mom and having to do my job and my boss supporting me in my job. And the editor-in-chief, MJ Day, she was so supportive. She's like, “Yeah, absolutely. It's your moment, go for it.” There was no hesitation with it.

I’ve thought like, “Oh, would it have been cooler if I would've really planned this out?” But it ended up working out to where it was, in my opinion, the best case scenario. It just showed how this moment of motherhood and postpartum bodies and the working mom on the runway came — because really that's what I was doing all day long, every two hours.

SM: I honestly love that it wasn’t planned. It just feels so, “This is just what moms do.” And it's normalizing it by actually normalizing it by not making a big statement about it.

MM: Yeah, exactly. 100%. And that was part of it too, is I feel like just being that kind of example that we figure it out. Moms always just get the shit done and figure it out.

SM: I was thinking about this during the Olympics with the speed skater, Francesca Lollobrigida, when she won and had her toddler afterwards. And the amount of people who were mad that they were like, “This is taking away from her moment.” And later she spoke out and basically said she wanted her kid up there with her.

MM: I mean, there's always a time — and I know moms can relate to this — where you want to have your moment and you work so hard for it. But I do find, for me especially — and it's not every mom, every mom has their own thing that they feel or want to go through — I find these really big moments of bringing them and showing them because I want to be that example for them, as cliche as it may sound. I had always assumed when you became a mom, you kind of had to give up those dreams. And it felt really cool and inspiring that it was actually the start of my career, the start of everything when I did become a mom. And I was like, “What better example of this is myself to show them that really there's no expiration date?” The limits you set are really on yourself. I've told myself the whole time like, “Oh my gosh, if I don't make it by 30, I'm never going to make it. I'm never going to do this.” So having that moment with Sports Illustrated as a mom, it felt like, oh my gosh, we can do anything at any point in our lives.

SM: Have you seen that quote where it's like, “It may be their childhood, but it's also your motherhood”?

MM: Yes, 100%. That’s exactly it.

SM: I also saw that you’ve advocated for gun safety in D.C.

MM: I felt like it was a disservice not to use this platform that I've been given and so anything that comes my way that I feel passionate about, especially in the motherhood space, I'm like, sign me up. I want to do this because it's just a huge way to share how I feel, but also the people that follow me are mostly mothers and women. And so at Capitol Hill, I mean, I don't know how your stance is on gun violence, but —

SM: Oh, I’m with you.

Mara Martin: OK. So I used to be one of those people where I would post “thoughts and prayers” anytime something like that would happen, and I'm like, I am being hypocritical. I need to do something about this. Posting on my stories is not enough. And so, this opportunity had come with March Fourth and to go to Capitol Hill, and we meet with senators. And I met the senators from Florida, where I'm from. And it just feels so much more important now, even though it's always been important. When I was there my first time, my oldest was in kindergarten. I remember her coming home and talking about these active shooter drills. And I'm like, oh my gosh, because we grew up in a world where we did the tornado drills and the fire drills.

So yeah, I go there with March Fourth, and we meet with senators and hope to make change and show that, again, moms are here. And they don't mess around with us because we're not going to leave. And they listen to everything that we say. And it feels like I could be more involved that way.

SM: Moms have to handle everything.

MM: It's always the moms. It's always the moms. I mean, I always say that. I'm like, if you ever need anything or job-wise, I'm like, just look to a mom to do it because they always figure it out.

SM: What other things are you doing now?

MM: Years after my viral moment, I started a public relations firm. And I now help other women and other brands maximize and elevate their viral moments. And so, I felt like that was such a cool way from going viral myself to then giving back to other creators and people trying to make it in the industry. And so, I now have this great roster of, again, mostly women and moms that are doing really incredible things. I feel, not like I'm an expert at it, but I always tell the people that I meet with as clients, I'm like, “I have a different edge because I've been on the other side of it where I know sharing your story is so important to you.” so you want someone who represents you, who gets that importance. I'm like, “I have a little bit of a uniqueness here,” or that I can position it in a way that is a little bit more storytelling because I've experienced it firsthand.

It would've never happened without that moment on the runway.

SM: What a moment to change everything, especially with your daughter. Being a girl who demanded food is actually a great thing to go viral for.

MM: That's exactly what it was. And I'm like, that's all it was, too. You were just crying and hungry in the back, and now look at our lives.

And I'll die on this hill, but I had always thought that when you become a mom, it consumes your life. And of course it does. But for me, it's just enhanced it so much because it gives you even a bigger purpose because usually you're doing things for yourself, and it's just constantly thinking of them. And I want to make them proud, too. So I want to do things that they look up to me and want to be like me. It just changed — being a mother has just changed so much of my perspective on everything.

SM: You and I have one mind on this. I always say my girls brought a light I didn’t know was there. All the stuff I used to stress about, it’s like, “Why?” They gave me such clarity.

MM: Everything that we worried about in our 20s or before kids does not matter anymore — you want to make them proud and make them see everything. I remember picking apart my looks and even my face, and I'm looking at my daughters, and I'm like, “I couldn't fathom them ever saying that about themselves.” There’s not even a thought that goes through my mind anymore when I get dressed because I don't want them ever to even have that in their thought process. And the millennial era, I mean, we grew up on tabloids of diet pills and starving yourself.

SM: I can still see Jessica Simpson in those size four jeans when they were like “She’s packing on the pounds!”

MM: It was such a crazy time, and it was just normal. That's just what you consumed. That's what you saw. That's what you read. That's what it was. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I know social media is challenging, and it's going to be challenging for our girls, but I feel confident that I'm going to make them confident in themselves and the way they perceive themselves, unlike our millennial era.

SM: Yeah I think the culture is still changing. And millennial moms are overcoming their own trauma.

MM: 100%. I feel like, I mean, I know everyone thinks their generation's the best, but I'm like millennial moms are it. They're peak of everything. They're the hottest. They're the bosses of their own, whatever they're doing. And I just feel like we have it all basically. We’ve experienced every part of internet, no internet, school shootings, 9/11, COVID, and we're just like these fierce moms, fierce women, just wanting to help our kids get out there.

SM: Just trying to feed our kids and get them home safe at the end of the day.

MM: Exactly.