Rapper Cardi B and her 1-year-old daughter Kulture are the latest cover stars for Vogue. Not only is this Cardi’s first time on the cover of Vogue, but it’s also her daughter’s first magazine cover, ever.
And in her interview with Vogue, Cardi talked about all things motherhood and marriage. Cardi is wed to fellow rapper Offset. They welcomed Kulture into their lives in 2018.
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“Being a mom—how can I say it?” Cardi tells Vogue, “Things are a little bit harder to balance, but it’s good for the mental. Like, if I’m playing with my daughter, I forget about the issues.”
The mom of one is hard at work producing her second album. She told Vogue that this second one comes with a lot more weight because people are expecting her to top her first album, which earned her a Grammy and made history.
“I wonder if people are gonna relate to the new things, to the new life, to the new sh*t that I gotta talk about now. Music is changing. I feel like people just wanna hear twerk-twerk music, but it’s like, is that just a phase? I probably need a sexy song. I need a lot of turn-up songs. I need a slow song, a personal song. And those are harder for me—I always need help when it comes to talking about my feelings. It’s hard for me to be soft, period. So it’s a lot of thoughts, a lot of pressure. It’s really like a job.”
And those new, highly anticipated songs, that highlight her most recent life experiences will include entering motherhood for the first time and being cheated on by her husband.
Cardi opened up about her public drama after learning Offset was unfaithful to her, and her decision to stay with him and work on their relationship.
“When me and my husband got into our issues—you know, he cheated and everything—and I decided to stay with him and work together with him, a lot of people were so mad at me; a lot of women felt disappointed in me.” She continued:
“But it’s real-life shit. If you love somebody and you stop being with them, and you’re depressed and social media is telling you not to talk to that person because he cheated, you’re not really happy on the inside until you have the conversation. Then, if you get back with them, it’s like, how could you? You let all of us down. People that be in marriages for years, when they say till death do us part, they not talking about little arguments like if you leave the fridge open. That’s including everything.”
She also talked about the hate she received for having a child with a man who has three children from previous relationships. “With Offset, I feel like his kids just bring a pop of fun to life when they’re in his house. I actually love it. It brings out a different side of him that I like to see, and I love to see my baby interacting with her siblings. The more the merrier.”
In the end, the young couple did what they needed to do for their family. Still together today, Cardi says they prayed a lot together during that particularly rough patch in their relationship. And ultimately, they pulled through.
And as Offset told Vogue, motherhood has changed Cardi, in a good way. “I think motherhood got her more focused. I always tell her, don’t follow the comments. But she’s been outspoken on things since before she was making music—she’s not ever putting on, she’s not ever being cool. At the end of the day, she’s still going to rap about the same sh*t, which is what it’s like being a woman.”
Motherhood has always been a dream of Cardi’s. However, she knew she wanted to wait to have kids until she was financially stable enough to support her offspring. And while balancing her career with being a mom has been hard, she said it’s only getting harder now that Kulture is getting older.
“Flying is hard on Kulture, so if I go to a place and I’m not going to stay more than five days, I’m not bringing her. But now that’s getting harder, because she’s sleeping on my chest and she doesn’t want to let me go, or she sees you on FaceTime and she’s crying. It’s kind of like a friendship now, and it’s hard to leave your little friend.”
Yet, despite the constant travel, and occasionally having to leave Kulture with her grandmother, she’s still a great mom. And as Cardi says, nothing will ever change that.
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“All the time I’m thinking about my kid. I’m shaking my a**, but at the same time I’m doing business, I’m on the phone with my business manager saying, make sure that a percentage of my check goes to my kid’s trust. I give my daughter so much love, and I’m setting her up for a future.”
She continued, “I want to tell her that a lot of the shit that I have done in life—no matter what I did, knowing that I wanted to have kids made me go harder to secure a good future for my kids.”
Everything she ever did is for the baby girl who has her whole entire heart and the only thing she wants in return is for Kulture “to be an owner of whatever the f**k she wants to own. Just be an owner. Be the boss.”