I am a mother. I am lots of other things but as society continues to discount and undervalue this role, it is easy to get frustrated and not claim it as loudly as I should. The world talks about how important mothers are. Yet often mothers are the last ones on the list to be asked for their opinion about the issues that affect them. The blogging and social media revolution is turning that around as the mothers who blog morph into a powerful global force. I have been privileged to be asked by the UN Foundation to participate in a conversation we have called, "Changing the World, One Mother At...

All over the world, women are still dying in childbirth. A woman dies every single minute. In the majority of countries it is usually due to the absence of good medical support. In the USA, a staggering number of women still deliver in the ER without having received any pre-natal care. There is also a disturbing trend that too much technology and interference is leading to creeping maternal mortality rates in America. Christy Turlington's documentary, No Woman No Cry raises some of the issues. Women need to be heard. To be heard requires understanding and knowledge. In this, women in America are very much like their sisters in Bangladesh, Tanzania and Guatemala, the locations of Turlington's stories.