Motherhood Quote by Mercedes Ruehl

"But in my own particular case, there was something that happened when I became a mother. Whenever in the news I saw an example of a child being abused or mistreated, my response went from being appalled to being physically revolted"

Mercedes Ruehl, Actress

About this Quote

Motherhood here isn`t framed as a cute life chapter; it`s pitched as a bodily rewire. Ruehl marks the shift with a blunt escalation: from "appalled" (moral, intellectual, still at a distance) to "physically revolted" (visceral, involuntary, impossible to file away). That move matters because it rejects the polite cultural script that empathy is a choice you perform. She`s describing empathy as an invasion. The body becomes the argument.

As an actress, Ruehl is also quietly telling you how perception changes when the stakes become personal. Parenthood isn`t presented as making her "more caring" in some abstract way; it changes the sensory register of the world. The news stops being content and turns into an assault. Subtext: we treat stories of child abuse as consumable tragedy, but for someone newly keyed to a child`s vulnerability, the media distance collapses. The protective instinct isn`t sentimental; it`s nauseating, angry, primal.

The context is a public sphere that asks us to witness endless harm without breaking down. Ruehl draws a line between compassionate attention and psychic overload. Her phrasing implies a critique of how normalized these headlines have become: you can be "appalled" repeatedly and still function; "physically revolted" suggests the psyche refusing to cooperate with that normalization. It`s not just about her motherhood. It`s about what it costs to stay human while the world keeps feeding you atrocities as daily updates.

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About the Author

Mercedes Ruehl

Mercedes Ruehl (born February 28, 1948) is a Actress from USA.

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