Mother Of The Year

Tammy Duckworth has become a heroine to working parents. But heroics from the Illinois senator are nothing new.

- Rebecca Johnson

Illinois Senator Ladda Tammy Duckworth owns a great pair of legs. They’re painstakingly painted by an artist to match the skin tone of her arm—right down to the freckles—and the second toe on one foot is longer than the first, just like her own used to be. But Duckworth can’t stand them. “When I see myself wearing those legs in a mirror, I see loss. But when I see this”—she gestures toward the steel-and-titanium prosthesis attached to her thigh above her right knee—“I see strength. I see a reminder of where I am now.” Same thing with her wheelchair. “People always want me to hide it in pictures. I say no! I earned this wheelchair. It’s no different from a medal I wear on my chest. Why would I hide it?”

She is sitting in the chair, a souped up Segway that she received from a veterans’ group, in a small office close to the floor of the U.S. Senate. Looped over its back is a bag with her breast pump. On the table in front of her is her daily schedule prepared by staffers. It is filled with meetings having to do with issues in her home state, a few Senate votes, and then, discreetly tucked in at four-hour intervals, a series of asterisks. Time to pump milk for her baby.