Motherhood Becomes Her

From being a television host who traveled around the country, Xandra Rocha Araneta transitioned to being a wife and mother and discovered life is just as fulfilling and rich dancing in the rain with her sons, running barefoot in the garden and watching them paint the walls.

- Sara Siguion-Reyna

Xandra Rocha Araneta was on the cover of in April 2014. She was just about to get married, and also had a good career as a television host for a show on gastronomic experiences in the Philippines. It was a busy life that took her on multiple travels. Much has changed since then. She is now in her fourth year of marriage to husband Luis, and a mother to two little boys, Thiago and Maximo. “I would never have imagined how much could change in just four years. I feel like a very different person to be honest,” she says. “Life took me down a path of self awareness and I feel like I’ve gotten to know myself better.”

On the day of the cover shoot, she considerately sent a text, foreseeing a delay and apologizing for the possibility of not making it at the appointed time. “Feeding the baby before I run out the door,” she messaged. “The hardest thing is adjusting to a life of much less sleep and learning how to balance everything,” she says, reflecting on the last four years of motherhood. “The late night feedings, diaper changes, I’m there. Some people don’t understand why I stress myself out about it, but I just feel l it's something I need to experience in my lifetime.”

Despite the late nights (“coffee is my new best friend,” she jokes), all is worth it for this self-confessed micromanager. “The best thing about motherhood are the lessons my children have taught me even at just two years old and five months old,” she says. “It’s funny because I always thought it would be the other way around, me teaching them. But, really, it's not; it's them teaching me.”

MESSING IN THE MUD