If Moms Ran the World...

At this year's Emmy Awards, Sally Field was censored for making the statement that "if mothers ran the world, there wouldn't be any goddamn wars!" And I recently had an epiphany on why that sentiment is true.

When my son was an infant, he spat up often. My husband and I would joke, "There he goes, making cheese again." I never gave it a second thought because babies spit up. It was never a lot, and he was tracking on the 75th percentile on all the growth charts. We found out after his first birthday that he has a lot of food allergies (wheat, eggs, dairy, fish, peanuts), which was causing his eczema to flare up. Once I cut all the offending foods out of my diet, his skin cleared up.

When my daughter broke out with eczema patches, I immediately cut all the foods my son was allergic to out of my diet. Her skin, too, cleared up immediately. I added the foods in one by one to determine exactly which foods exascerbated her eczema. The culprits: egg and dairy. I know this because even a teaspoon of mayonnaise on a sandwich I ate would result in her spitting up after I nursed her.

Then the thought seized upon me: all that "cheese" my son made, was it because I hadn't cut out the offending foods from my diet? Did I short-change him nutritionally because of all the milk he lost when he would spit up? I was racked with guilt - if he ends up being scrawny, is it because of what I ate while I was nursing him?

My husband told me not to worry, I didn't know at the time, and to move on. And that's the difference. Men will plead ignorance and never give a transgression a second thought. Damage is done, but a man will move on.

Mothers, on the other hand, worry. They tie the most insignificant, inconsequential moments to larger events, to actions, to reactions, and they scrutinize themselves, constantly contemplating how their own actions played a part in how a situation unfolds. Mothers consider the people around them, and they take some accountability for the impact, good or bad, they have on others.

There are definitely advantages to being able to move on. Certainly, moving on results in less money spent on therapy (psychological and retail). Yet, I can't help but think that the world might be in a better state if our world leaders felt the accountability for the human race the way mothers accept responsibility for the well-being of their children.