A shout out to all mothers!

I would like to pay a special tribute to my wonderful mother that does not give herself enough credit! She is an amazing woman that I truly admire. I am grateful to have a mother that has taught me the value of hard work and supports me in all that I strive to accomplish. She is one of the greatest, most selfless people I know! 

While I do not want to detract from my own mother and how much I care for her and wish to celebrate her, I would also like to take some time to pay tribute to all mothers around the globe. Let’s think about moving the apostrophe so that it becomes not just Mother’s Day, honoring a single mother, but Mothers’ Day — an occasion to try to help other mothers around the globe.

I faithfully follow Nicholas Kristof, who is a writer for the New York Times. He writes about a variety of global [conflict] issues. His article in lieu of Mother's Day is beautiful! I have pulled a few interesting stats from this article, but you may also link to the article in its entirety here.

Some $14 billion will be spent in the United States for Mother’s Day this year, according to the National Retail Federation. That includes $2.9 billion in meals, $2.5 billion in jewelry and $1.9 billion in flowers.

To put that sum in context, it’s enough to pay for a primary school education for all 60 million girls around the world who aren’t attending school. That would pretty much end female illiteracy.

These numbers are fuzzy and uncertain, but it appears that there would be enough money left over for programs to reduce deaths in childbirth by about three-quarters, saving perhaps 260,000 women’s lives a year. There would probably even be enough remaining to treat tens of thousands of young women suffering from one of the most terrible things that can happen to a person, a childbirth injury called an obstetric fistula.

These numbers blow me away! Haven't hear enough statistics yet? Check this out:

• The United States’ rate for maternal mortality is 1 in 4,800 – one of the highest in the developed world.”
• A woman in the Unites States is more than five times as likely as a woman in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece or Italy to die from pregnancy-related causes in her lifetime and her risk of maternal death is nearly 10-fold that of a woman in Ireland. (2010 State of the World's Mothers)
• 50 million women in the developing world give birth without professional help and 8.8 million children and newborns die from easily preventable or treatable causes.
• The risk of a woman dying from pregnancy or childbirth-related causes in Niger is 1 in 7.  The risk is 1 in 8 in Afghanistan and Sierra Leone.  Compared to Ireland, that risk was 1 in 47,600.

 Every minute, a mother dies from complications during pregnancy or childbirth. In fact, in many countries, a girl is more likely to die in pregnancy than to finish secondary school. Mothers should be remembered and honored today, on Mother's Day, but I hope tha

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t we can see a turn in some of the frightening statistics and see women’s lives become more of a priority!