Motherland Australia

This week, I'm thrilled to interview the face behind the Billie and Grace brand, Andrea. Andrea lives in the Hunter region of New South Wales with her husband and daughter Mabel. After battling with serious endometriosis, Andrea had an uphill battle to conceive Mabel through IVF. But from there, motherhood proved to be her biggest challenge yet. Mabel has suffered from several medical complic...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Sarah Parkinson from Victoria. She opens up about life on the land, and the loneliness she felt throughout the early years of motherhood. Sarah's husband is a dairy farmer who works long, gruelling hours, as so many of our partners do. She struggled with postnatal depression during this time and soon realised she wasn't taking any time out for herself...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Benita Bensch who shares her incredible journey to start a family. Benita was consumed by her challenge to conceive. For four years she fought for the family she'd always dreamed of, then, navigated her way through an anxiety-ridden pregnancy and later a surprise set of twins. Her battle with infertility was so difficult and so dark, she kept an intimate j...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Elizabeth Rosser who lives on a beef property in Western Australia. Elizabeth is very open about her battle with postnatal depression, and how isolated she has felt over the years as a mum. Amongst the chaos of raising three kids on the land, she's also moved interstate three times- the most recent change from Tassie to WA, all in the middle of a global pa...

Today is a bonus episode with the beautiful Nikki McCahon, founder and host of the Dear Mama Project podcast, and matrescence educator. Nikki's work supporting and coaching women through their motherhood journey is incredibly powerful. In Episode 52 of Motherland, Courtney Walker and I touched on the word matrescence, something I am very passionate about, and the secret sauce that has helped...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Toni Nolan from Victoria. She's a mum to three beautiful children including twins, a family she never thought she'd be able to have. Just a couple of months before her wedding day, Toni was almost killed in a car accident, which split her pelvis in half and left her with severe post traumatic amnesia. She's a former body sculptor, and drew upon a...

This week, I catch up with Elisha Parker who was named Queensland's 2020 AgriFutures Rural Woman of the Year. She's our very own Erin Brockovich, working as a lawyer, specialising in asbestos related diseases. She also runs her own online cattle business, all while raising two young children. We talk motherhood, identity, career and marriage breakdown. How she does it all, I'll neve...

This week, I catch up with Courtney Walker who lives on a cattle station in Western Australia. After moving to a remote town to teach at an indigenous school, life changed forever when she fell in love with a farmer. Courtney is unashamedly honest about how difficult she's found motherhood on the land. She's long battled to be what she thought she needed to be, the 'perfect' st...

This week, I catch up with outback trucker Danyelle Haigh, a rural mum who's raising kids on the road... literally. Her and her husband travel 10 months of the year installing bores for drought stricken farmers. Danyelle takes us through her incredible battle to conceive her two kids, and what it's like being a mum while living in a shipping container on the back of a road train. This is...

For Motherland's 50th episode, I catch up with Karen Brock, Tasmania's Agrifutures Rural Woman of the Year. She's known for her incredible work in the horticulture industry as a plant tissue culture specialist, but her personal story as a woman and as a mother has never been told like this. It's a deep and dark look into the domestic violence she endured in her first marriage w...

This week I catch up with Libby Creek from South Australia. This Thursday is International Rural Women's Day, and Libby's story certainly has a global flavour. From Kangaroo Island to Kazakhstan- what she's seen and achieved in the beef industry is inspiring. She's juggled the demands of work with motherhood from across the globe and suffered enormous heartache along the way in...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Phoebe Neuendorf from Queensland. For this Brisbane born beauty, her love affair with the land began when she swiped right on Tinder and met her match! Her and her husband have a beautiful one year old boy Angus who has achondroplasia; the most common form of dwarfism. October is Dwarfism Awareness Month and Phoebe is very passionate about educating more people...

This week I catch up with rural mum Felicity Blore from Victoria, a survivor in so many ways. The mum of two had a terrifying near death experience after a car accident during the 2011 Queensland floods. When it comes to motherhood, both her girls made a very dramatic entrance into the world, and there's been hurdle after hurdle since. Felicity has also battled crippling postnatal depression,...

This week, I catch up with rural mum and dairy farmer Jo Morgan French from North West Tasmania. Jo spent 11 years in the army, with several overseas deployments including six months in Afghanistan when her first child was just nine months old. Her experience is a powerful one that smashes many female stereotypes. She's a woman who never wanted kids, or a big white wedding, and chose to leave...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Grace Dawn from the Northern Territory. Grace grew up just 45 minutes from Sydney, but now lives on a remote property 400km from Katherine. As a first time mum, she admits the isolation has been crippling at times, and she opens up very honestly about what it's been like navigating motherhood while battling anxiety. This is her story. SPONSOR: This week&ap...

This week I catch up with rural mum Sallie Jones from Victoria Sallie is the co-founder of Australian premium milk brand, Gippsland Jersey... a business she's poured her heart into after losing her dad to suicide. Sallie is a huge advocate for rural mental health. She's also in the thick of the motherhood juggle, having had three kids in 3 and a half years years, and amongst it all, laun...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Kerrie Robertson from South Australia. Kerrie is a mum of three girls, and a rural journalist with the ABC. Her motherhood journey has been full of twists and turns. After suffering three devastating miscarriages in a row, she welcomed her beautiful daughter Bonnie almost 18 months ago... her other two children are 12 and 10. So what's it like dealing with...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Rosie Fowler from Tasmania. Rosie's motherhood journey was going very smoothly until a medical illness rocked their little family. So often we've spoken about mums with sick children. But what happens when you, the mum, the glue holding everything together is the one fighting for life? Last year, when her son was just 8 months old, Rosie was diagnosed...

This week's bonus episode is with mum of three Melissa Spilsted, the Founder of Hypnobirthing Australia. So if you're pregnant, planning to get pregnant, or are just interested in birth, this is for you. I've enrolled in their online course myself to prepare for baby number two, and I love it. Melissa is passionate about helping rural mums understand that despite geographical isolat...

This week, I catch up with rural mum from Victoria Kerry McKinnon. Kerry is well out of the motherhood trenches, with three older children who have all finished school. We chat all things life on the land with kids, including what the future holds for some of us such as schooling decisions, the sometimes tricky topic of succession planning, and what it means to be a woman in ag. I've had many...

This week, I catch up with rural mum of four, Katrina Myers from New South Wales. Katrina is an avocado farmer, podcaster and well being and business coach. Her positive spirit and her genuine happiness paints a very different picture to the woman she used to be. After losing her father to suicide as a teenager, it wasn't long before she faced her own demons Motherhood, and post natal depress...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Chantelle Fisher from Victoria. Chantelle is a mum of five, with a sixth on the way. For many many large families, there's an assumption that that's the way things were planned... but Chantelle's story is a little different. After having three children, she desperately wanted a fourth, but her husband didn't. So, she wrote him a letter. What...

Today is a bonus episode with rural mum and grandma Diane Dorwick who's a nurse with the Royal Flying Doctor Service. I had an overwhelming response from Motherland mums who wanted to hear from someone with Diane's experience. For those who have dealt with the RFDS first hand, you know just how crucial their service is. So in case of emergency on the land, what do you do? Are you as prep...

This week, I catch up with rural mum and mental wellness coach Zoe Jackson from New South Wales. Zoe is a mum to two beautiful kids, who are about as close in age as you can get....just 12 months apart! Her biggest battle has been with her son Percy who has autism. Zoe opens up about what it's like raising a child on the land who has a disability, including her incredible perseverance when th...

This week, I catch up with rural mum Edwina Hick from Queensland. Edwina shares her story of motherhood on the land, including her very powerful account of her struggles with postnatal depression in the early years. I'm very passionate about postnatal mental health. It can strike anyone at anytime. Edwina is well past the trenches now, with her two children in boarding school. There is much m...