Kali Uchis On Her Hopeful, Heartbreaking, Harmonious Year

In 2024, on the day of my baby shower, my mom was diagnosed with lung cancer. This pregnancy was definitely not what I expected—but it was even more special, in a way, that I was able to give my mom so much joy; she was so happy feeling my belly. Her wish was to be here long enough to meet my son. My entire pregnancy was me knowing, inevitably, that I could lose her, but I was optimistic that my mom was going to survive and that she would be here with us a lot longer. I was really hoping for that until the very end.

When I found out I was pregnant, I felt a deeper connection to the baby than I've ever had in my life. For a long time in my life, I’d felt very alone. Growing up, my relationship was strained with both of my parents; I still have a strained relationship with my dad. I've never talked about why and I don't think I ever will. It’s really personal and my mom’s not here to tell her side, so it’s unfair to tell my perspective. A lot of stories about me mention that and I lived in my car for a time as a teenager (I was raised in my mom’s native Alexandria, Virginia and Colombia, where my dad is from) and so what I will say is that no kid is rebellious or doesn't want to go home for no reason. There were a lot of problems at home, but I know now my mom was doing the best she could. She suffered from anxiety, among other things. She had three kids and a job as a secretary. (I used to play secretary when I was little, because I wanted to be like her.) When you become a parent, you have more grace for your parents.

Even before she got sick and I got pregnant, we moved past it, my mom and I. She actually made the effort to work on our relationship and try to get closer. A lot of parents of their generation will not take accountability or have difficult conversations. My mom wasn’t like that. She had a good heart and she genuinely did love me. We were able to mend things with the help of a mediator, and we both got a lot of closure. I was really grateful, hoping we’d be able to make up for lost time. Shortly after, she got her diagnosis.

Music gave me an escape and a place to process everything. I love to pour out how I feel and write a story. A lot of times, I write music to someone, so listening is like reading a letter. Each song on my new album, “Sincerely,” is a different letter to a different receiver. I thought Sincerely was a beautiful title because the songs are so vulnerable and they're more emotional; it was a perfect encapsulation of how the music sounds. The songs span over two years and different headspaces—the oldest goes back to when I was working on my last album [2024’s] “Orquídeas.” Then I made songs during pregnancy, and a few songs after, mostly at home in Los Angeles.

A lot of people ask, “Where do you even find the time?” but music is the least complicated part of my life. It’s something that I do naturally, like breathing. There's one song that I wrote the day after my son was born: “ILYSMIH (I Love You So Much It Hurts).” I first got the idea for it, actually, in the hospital bed. “All the world is crazy, but you’re here… For once in my life, I’m not alone anymore.” Giving birth to my son, there was a genuine feeling of: this is my family. He's brought a sense of stability that I really, really needed.

I’m grateful that my mom got her wish and lived to meet my baby. After he was born early last year, I would call her every day so she could see him, or we’d visit her. She always said how much he brightened her day. My mom had a childlike nature. She loved comedy and cat videos and anything yellow, like sunflowers and daffodils and lemons. I didn't see that side of her as much during my childhood because she was suffering, but that’s how I remember her now. These last few years, she let go a lot, and I was able to see and appreciate her for who she really was. She was silly and funny. She’d tell long, drawn-out stories and laugh loudly at the dumbest things. She was just so pure.

I lost my mom just as my son’s life was starting. She passed away this past winter, a week before his first birthday. My mom stuck around so much longer than she expected. I got to crawl up in the hospital bed with her and hold her hand as she took her last breath. I made sure she didn’t feel alone. I was happy that I got to say my goodbyes, but it’s also traumatic. There’s no loss like your mom. As a new mom, I had a lot of mixed feelings. You're very happy for this new life, but then you're also grieving your mom—I was grieving my mom from the moment I found out that she was sick, and then I was hit with another layer when she passed. It's so hard to want to pick up the phone and not be able to call her or to know my son won’t really remember her. After my mom passed, I came home and then I had to plan the rest of his first birthday party. The first year is such a hard one, especially for a first-time mom, but I couldn't really process his first birthday because I was—I’m still—processing that my mom is not here anymore. I like to think that she still saw the celebration. I like to think she’s in heaven.

Had my baby not been here, I don't know how I would've gotten through that time. I’m stuck with him like glue. I’m not a let-him-become-independent-too-soon type of parent. I believe kids need their parents in the first three years more than ever. Our son, who’s a little over a year old now, still sleeps in the same room with us [editor’s note: the baby’s father and Uchis’s partner, rapper Don Toliver]. I don’t let him cry it out. When we wake up, the first thing we do is play with him. That comes first, before work, for his dad, too. Building that secure attachment means more than anything else right now. As long as I can keep doing that for the next two years, I'll be happy.

Becoming parents puts a lot of pressure on the relationship. Someone told me that, statistically, a lot of couples break up during the first year. Because we’re both artists, we have to balance our schedules and find time as a family to take our baby on trips and to not be too distant. For us, it's been really important to keep that romance—to go on dates and have our little slumber party nights. Everybody wants to give their kid a two-parent home and with our careers, it's not easy. It takes a lot of effort. Of course, nothing is ever perfect, but I'm always making sure that he's okay and he's always making sure that I'm okay. “It’s Just Us” is my man’s favorite song on “Sincerely,.” He stopped by the studio in Houston [Toliver’s hometown] to check on me. It has a Western feel and he was enamored.

I have a very different approach to parenting than either of my parents. My mom had to work a lot and she worked immediately after having me, maybe that made our attachment harder. Luckily, I didn’t have to. I’m okay enough in life that I'm going to take some time to be with my kid and work from home as much as I can. It's crazy because some people who do have the privilege to stay at home still choose not to because we are all burdened by the need to advance ourselves career-wise. I’ve had moments where I wanted to prove people wrong who think I'm not going to make music anymore and I'm just going to retire and be a stay-at-home mom. Then there's this other side of me that's like, but what's wrong with that? For me, a big part of becoming a mom was weighing that balance between work and family, and also understanding that my mom didn’t have the privilege.

I had to unlearn a lot of capitalistic brainwash because I grew up in an immigrant household, around family members coming to America for the first time—the most hardworking people you could imagine. I was constantly told that I had to work hard. From a young age, my friends were playing and I’d be like, I have to go help my dad do construction. It’s something you realize when you lose somebody really close to you: Am I going to be on my deathbed saying I wish I worked a little bit harder, or I wish I could have one more cuddle with my kid? You’re reminded of the fragility and the vulnerability of life.

My man and I have talked a lot about making sure our son understands that it's important to do things for yourself, to do chores and give back so he’s cognizant that there are people who need more than he does and he can help, but I’m also so happy for him to grow up differently. His father and I both came from humble beginnings. My mom said that they named me my given name Karly because Karly means strong, and it's crazy because it’s something that, my whole life, people have always said: “Wow, you're so strong.” I'm just really grateful that my son doesn't have to be strong. We already endured enough pain and suffering for him to have a beautiful, easy life where he can just enjoy it and he doesn’t have to work if he doesn’t want to work —that's also okay. I’m not going to give him an unlimited amount of money and we want to teach him the value of everything, but it's a huge blessing that our kids won’t have to suffer the way we did. I want them to have enjoyment, rest, peace, love, happiness, all the good things, because we're all on borrowed time.

Taking our power back should be about reclaiming what motherhood really means. A huge thing people say about my mom is: “She was so great because she put everybody else first.” Well, that wasn’t fair to her. I like to think that in another timeline, my mom put herself first and that she lived the way that she really deserved. Part of the reason why I dedicated my album to my mom is because I want other women to know that it's okay for us to not put everybody else first. We don't have to constantly sacrifice ourselves and we don't have to be the hardest working mom ever to make everybody else proud. It's okay to rest. It's okay to do things for yourself and to put yourself first. I want to honor her by inspiring other women to remember that this life is ours. We have to live it the way we want to.

The title “Sincerely,”—and the idea of songs as letters—took on even deeper meaning after my mom passed. Looking back on her things, I found a box I’d never seen before, and inside was anything that I ever wrote to her. I also found my baby book, which is burnt on one side. Our house burned down, but my mom saved it for me. In the book, she wrote a series of letters to me. I think the first is from when I'm four weeks old, and she was just writing to tell me how loved I was. She had beautiful handwriting. I never understood until I became a mom how much effort goes into safeguarding all of these memories so that one day, when you grow up, you can see your first hat from the hospital or the first tooth you lost. Reading the letters she left me, I feel like I'm talking to her again. That put it into full motion for me: I'm going to dedicate “Sincerely,” to my mom, because all I have left that really makes me feel close to her is her writing.

I write letters to my son now, and his dad does, too. Our son is so smart and very sentient. He loves cars and trucks and animals. He started talking pretty early and he knows how to say people’s names. When I'm cooking, he likes to be next to me with his little fake cooking stuff. It's important to us to let him know that he can do things on his own—that was part of me becoming such an imaginative kid and such a strong-willed person. I think when we do too much for our kids, we steal their confidence. He’s in his bossy era and he loves to explore outside. We usually watch the sunset and the sunrise together—we say goodbye to Mr. Sun.

Our bond is a kind of happiness that I really can't explain—it’s family and home and community. From the time he was born, I felt like nothing else matters except for this person. You're able to tune out a lot of background noise and the menial things that we can get so caught up in that might not be of any importance when we're actually at the end of our rope. Having a baby made me more conscious of: What am I putting my energy towards? Is this something that I'm going to be proud of in my last days? As a mom, I’m able to look more existentially at my purpose, my life, my work. They always say the first year is the hardest—now I just need to get him through 17 more. My friend who got pregnant with her second when I was pregnant with my first has been assuring me that it gets easier. Some day, God willing, I also really want a daughter.

Photographer Michael Oliver Love | Stylist Kat Typaldos | Hair Stylist Danielle Priano | Makeup Artist Etienne Ortega | Manicurist Michelle Tran