Ruth Lubic is a woman on a mission. At an age when most people would have already retired, she embarked on a new project - starting a midwife-operated birthing center in one of the poorest areas of Washington D.C. The infant mortality rate in D.C.

While wondering today how I would segue into writing about model Christy Turlington and former Spice Girl Geri Halliwell's recent campaign for maternal health, I unexpectedly came across a blog post about that very subject that stopped me in my tracks and left me in tears. The post was on Single Mom Seeking by guest blogger Matt Logelin who lost his wife and mother of their child just hours after she gave birth.

About nine months after I had my first child, I went (with the kiddo in tow) to my first Mothers Acting Up meeting. It was my first foray, at least post-children, into an organized activist group. While the timing wasn't right for me to become a regular member, I gleaned a piece of knowledge from that meeting that I think will always stay with me. That is that mothers as a whole are a very, very large group, and if they use their power for good, they can become a force to be reckoned with.

In less than a week, my firstborn child, my baby girl Ava will turn 4. While this isn't often considered a major milestone, it is still very dear to my heart, being her mother and all. It got me thinking about how good we have it here in North America. I feel fortunate to live in a country where we have access to things such as clean water, nutritious food and medical care.

If you had asked me a few days ago what an obstetric fistula was, I'd have shrugged my shoulders and told you, "I don't know." Thanks to advances in modern medicine and in obstetric and midwifery care, fistula has been eradicated in North America for over 100 years. Although the condition has been long since forgotten here, there are at least 2 million women in Africa, Asia and the Arab region living with fistula, and some 50,000 to 100,000 new cases develop each year. These estimates are believed to be low.

On Thursday, May 15, Blogcatalog.com is challenging bloggers to Unite for Human Rights by posting words, pictures and/or videos. While the words might change from country to country and are sometimes taken for granted, human rights represent one of the universally agreed upon ideas — that all people are born with basic rights and freedoms that include life, liberty, and justice. This year marks the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations.

When I was building the landing page for our BlogHers Act - GlobalGiving campaign I went ahead and made my donation before we officially launched. It's always good to test these things, I like testing things.

In just over a month, I will be delivering my baby in one of the best obstetric hospitals in my country. I will have the best doctors, a private room, and every comfort. If I wanted to, I could have a highly-trained midwife, and a doula, and have my home outfitted to accommodate a comfortable home birth. I have every reason to expect - even though I know that there are no guarantees - that I will have a safe and straightforward delivery. It is unlikely in the extreme that anything terrible will happen to either myself or my baby, assuming no complications with the pregnancy.

Yesterday Lisa Stone announced that BlogHer has teamed up with Global Giving in an effort to save as many women's lives as possible between now and Mother's Day. There are several worthwhile causes to support, one of which is helping Afghan women safely birth healthy babies.

It's hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that nearly 10 million children worldwide die each year before the age of five, yet that is the reality according to a NY Times Op-Ed piece. We are fortunate that we aren't plagued with loss like that here in America, but in places like Sudan, where families are confronted with "every disease imaginable, from leprosy to malaria," it is estimated that approximately "one-quarter of children die by the age of five."

Any of you see the movie Juno? Or the movie Knocked Up? And even if you didn't, did you follow any of the discussion about how these movies were unrealistic and/or unbelievable and/or just plain irresponsible for not treating abortion as the 'rational' choice for young women dealing with an unwanted pregnancy? If you've remained blissfully unaware of any of this, it's easy enough to bring you up-to-date. Just read the third line of this paragraph again. That about sums it up.

A recent study revealed that a surprisingly large number of deaths among pregnant women in developing nations are from infectious diseases such as malaria, as opposed to from pregnancy-related illnesses. The findings suggest that many of these deaths are preventable.