Love story of Atom Araullo's parents gets featured in 'Humans of Pinas'
Atom Araullo's parents Carol and Miguel enjoy some celebrity status as their love story earns the spotlight in an online community page called Humans of Pinas.
Humans of Pinas is a community page hosted on Facebook that claims to be inspired by the celebrated Humans of New York. For this year's Valentine's Day, the page featured Carol and Mike whose love story spans over five decades.
Atom's mom was a freshman taking up AB Psychology in UP Diliman when she met Atom's dad, nine years her senior, who was already reviewing for his Engineering board exams at the time.
Mike was Carol's first and only boyfriend, but their love story wasn't all idyllic and romantic as the early days of their relationship happened during the beginnings of Martial Law.
Carol recalled, “Considering that during the heady years of my involvement in student activism, my boyfriend was already starting his professional career, one would expect that we would inevitably grow apart, politically and personally.
"But he was a steadfast, caring and understanding person who stood by me through thick and thin--my winning by a landslide in the last UP student council elections; going underground during martial law; becoming a political prisoner; and then going back to school for another seven years (four of them in med school where one is mostly either studying or trying to catch up on one's sleep).
“One thing that he proved to me early on: he was a person of his own convictions and that he would not become a national democratic activist just because I was. In fact, when a rumor spread that I was actually a government spy pretending to be an activist, he said he did not for a moment believe it, but if he found out that it was true, he would have no qualms about breaking off our relationship. How is that for principles?”
After eight years of being together, Carol and Miguel got married and their union blessed them with two children, Atom and his older sister Alessandra.
Carol also opened up at how their relationship and family life were tested.
“My poor husband thought that, with his small business and my medical practice, we would be able to earn enough to live independently, if modestly, from our parents. Unfortunately, his business almost ran aground after a bad deal while my work in a non-profit NGO meant a rather meager salary.
"It's a good thing that, for some uncanny reason, we both loved "antiques" (actually, hand-me-down stuff) that he repurposed to make functional or decorative so we were able to make do.
"But what really saved us, for which he now says he will be forever grateful to me, is that my activist orientation kept me content (happy even) with our frugal lifestyle. He said he never felt pressured to keep earning more so we could go on vacation trips, buy a late-model car or go on shopping sprees.
“On the other hand, being a dedicated activist while raising one's children can be really difficult and a source of strain, if not conflict, in one's marital life-- especially in those times when I had to leave home and the kids were just toddlers because of security concerns.
"It was always a balancing act as far as I was concerned while, with my husband, it was always family first. His unstinting dedication to raising our children to be the beautiful persons they are now are what kept us whole as a family. This I have to acknowledge.”
Read the full account of their love story here: