You're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast. Mama Miya acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast is recorded on. Hello, it's Mia here, and I wanted to share with you a podcast interview that I didn't do but I wish I had. It's from our sister podcast Mid where Holly Wainwright interviews incredible gen X women with incredible stories, and this is one that I particularly think you're gonna love. So my Jade McKinnon was a big,
famous TV star in Australia. You might know her better as Stevie, the character she played in McLeod's Daughters that was such a beloved part of Australian entertainment and was such a huge thing on our TV screens. She then went to Hollywood. She was Ali in Baywatch and that's where she worked alongside her fiance at the time, Jason Momoa, before everything changed. He went on to marry a big Hollywood star. Then he became a Hollywood star. He now
makes millions and is incredibly famous. But simone, Jade's life was very, very different. She didn't stay in Hollywood, she didn't make millions. Instead, she became a single mother, and for a long time she was really really broke. It's such a fascinating story because I think so often we think that just because someone's face is recognizable and they were famous once, that their life will be happily ever after. And her story is actually so much more interesting than that,
and so much more meaningful. Enjoy this episode of Mid with Simone Jade McKinnon interviewed by hollywain Right. And if you want to hear more amazing stories like this, go follow Mid wherever you get your podcasts.
The midlife woman of Hollywood's imagination lives in a windswept beach house, or in a chic Brooklyn brownstone, maybe a tasteful Hampton style home with a kitchen island the size of a pool table, an ape burn, a stone, and a butler's pantry out the back. She wears tasteful roll necks as she dips in and out of a fulfilling career at will, usually something she can work on at
that home. Billowing with the smell of freshly baked bread, she returns from the farmer's market with arms full of freshly cut daffodils, and she brunches like she lunches often and without ever lowering her eyes to the bottom of the bill. Maybe you live like that, More likely you don't.
There's something we don't like to talk about that matters more than almost anything when you're mid money, because it's a time of life when choices you weren't even aware you were making at twenty and thirty can come home and build a stinky nest on your shoulder like a squawking raven or a sweary parrot. Chose a career for love, not money. Squawk decided to study another few years. Squawk saved travels spent, save to travel spent. Squawk got blindsided
by the call to care for someone you love. Squawk seduced by the free money promise of a shiny new credit card. Squawk didn't push for that pay rise because it's not what good girls do. Squawk stopped working to be with your little kids and put your financial security in the hands of someone you thought you could always trust Squawk. Squawk. Squawk worked in a caring profession. Squawk.
None of those non decisions were wrong. The very idea that there are years ahead when times will change and it might be harder to get a job, earn money get yourself out of a difficult spot seems like science fiction when you're young and happy to toddle a high wire without even asking about a safety net. We don't like to talk about it because of what happens when you fall. By mid women to know what's what, be mature and careful and planned. We're supposed to see a
clear path ahead that promises comfort and choice. But we're not immune, no matter what gen Z tell us daily from the pressures and problems of an ever more expensive world as our perceived value falls. We have mortgages and rent to make. We have families of all ages and stages to feed and care for. The cost of caring for your parents, for yourself when you need it, sales ever higher and taps you awake at night as you add and subtract and shift in your head. For one
parent families, those maths get heavier and more complex. You've heard I'm sure about the fifty something women living in their cars, that it's the group of us most likely to find themselves without a home. Maybe it's closer for you than a report on the news. And then also, we're maybe the first generation of women to have earned well en mass the first to have serious choice about
this phase of our lives. To build wealth, we need to thank no one for our rebellious generation is all over the place and at all the extremes, which is for us pretty standard. Perhaps the most goal post shifting thing we can do right here is to do what our mothers didn't show each other as sweary parrots and talk about money. Hello. I am Holly Wainwright and I am Mid mid Life, mid Family, mid overwhelm. Welcome to our show for gen X women who are anything but mid.
And I want to say that we get quite a lot of messages here at mid from people who don't fall into that specific generation but love the conversations we're having here, and I want to say to you welcome. Mid is a state of mind, friends, as well as a very real place. As the generation sometimes referred to as the forgotten one between the much maligned boomers and millennials. We're always happy when we're noticed and people want to
sit with us. You can sit with us, So take a seat, because today we're talking about money with someone who knows as well as many that not everyone over thirty or forty is rich, not even everyone who's well known is rich. Not even everyone who was in an iconic TV show in the Nordies is rich. See where I'm going. Simone Jade McKinnon was and is to many
Stevie from McLeod's Daughters if you're not familiar. That show about a family of rural women in Australia's telegenic outback was massive in the Nordies, and Simone, originally from rural Queensland, herself, was massive along with it.
I promise I will continue to love you in good times and in bad, and when I'm old and gray, you will still.
Be the honest woman I've ever seen in my life.
She joined fresh from the Baywatch Hawaii cast, with a Hollywood sta fiance on her arm and a creative career very well established, and then everything changed. Simone and her beautiful son Madigan have been living in a caravan and then a shed in her family's back paddock for the best part of a decade. She's been making edend's meet with cares, subsidy on jobs like Jillaroo, and by starting her own small business which has ridden the roller coaster
of COVID. Many of you will relate. I'm sure when she decided to step out of a dark time and back in front of a camera to go on a reality show earlier this year. It was very clearly with one goal in mind, the prize money. You'll hear how that went, and in our conversation you'll hear what it was like to be on one of the biggest shows in the world and to get fired for what you
refuse to do in lingerie on a beach. You'll hear how she came back from crippling panic attacks during a high profile breakup to fill wedding scenes for our viewing pleasure. And most importantly, you'll hear how she's kept moving and dreaming and pushing on as she's been parenting her son alone on a very minimal income. Simone is famous, but she's not rich, and we often assume those things go together. Her story might not be yours, but there's plenty of
familiar territory here for all of us mids. Welcome to Mid's very first conversation about money with Simone Jade McKinnon. Simone, everyone assumes that well known people are rich.
Right.
You've got a face that's familiar from one of the most beloved Australian TV shows of all time. But you've been very open about the fact that you're not rich. Is it a strange disconnect that people are like, there's that famous lady, she must have it all sorted out.
I yeah, you know, I think a lot of people, not just because I'm a single mummy that I think a lot of people think actors in general because they see the American actors, so they think Aussie actors are on the same pay. We get the same kind of residuals that other people maybe in America get, But yeah, you know, once you've done and dusted on a show here, there is some residuals that trickle feed. But if you haven't worked for as long as I haven't worked, then
they're used up very quickly. And I guess it does shock people that we're not like America, that we can't live off one show as great as McLeod's was. We just don't get paid that much.
You mean you weren't quite the Friends cast, is what you're saying.
It was not even close to what those guys got for half an hour work. Yeah. No, we're just nothing like that. So I think people they assume that it's the same as America. But I think they'd be really shocked to know what we get paid compared to what they get paid. And that's why once you gigens it iss.
Yeah, which is why I mean, actors always very honestly talk about leaving from job to job, and that isn't as glamorous as it all appears. But I think people still kind of imagine that they've got it all sorted out. Tell me a bit about what your real life, as I always like to call like life away from work. Tell me a bit about what your real life looks like now.
My real life now is definitely different to any other lives. I feel like I've had lots of lives. There was the dancer life, there was an actor life, there's a single mum life, and now there's this kind of small business life. And the small business life is hard to I'm in a caravan and a shed, and I've been in a caravan since twenty sixteen, and I was solidly in that caravan until end of twenty and nineteen when the shed was finally built and wicked kind of spread out a little bit.
And is this on a property, And I know you live in northern new Well, Mid Northern New South Wales. Is your shadd and your caravan on a property?
Yes, so it's on our old family land, which so I sold up. I did have. I had enough money to buy myself a nice little house and so when Madigan was born, I relocated from South Australia to Coffs Harbor to Beanie family. Being a single mum, I knew that I needed help and so it did. Like I had a nice house back then because of thanks to McLeod's for the years of work I put that into there. But I realized after six years in that house that I wasn't going to be able to stay. So that's
why I sold up. And I wanted to do this bucket list dream which was the round Oz run the Lab.
So you and your son together doing like around Australia sort of odyssey in your caravan.
Right, Yeah, well I didn't. I wasn't in the acting world, you know. I thought I was nailing it as a single mum, loving it. Madigan was about to start school and I was like, this is the perfect time to do it. I'll sell up. I didn't need that big house that I had. I realized that wasn't it for me? I would rather the adventure than the things. It was great for that first six years, you know, a great home base. Madigan's first memories were in this amazing old Queenslander and you know it was lucky.
You've always led towards adventure a bit and travel.
Yeah, I do. My parents traveled with me from I was two and a half. So I was born in Mount Is my sister was born, and then when she was six months, I was two and a half. They hit the road in a little tiny caravan. So my first memories I don't remember Mount iSER, but my first memories were in a van. It's two and a half years. So by the time I went into KINDI that's when we stopped. So I always say that it was those guys that put the sort of gypsy. They gave me
the wanderlus. It just has been that way. And then I went into two different careers, you know, my dancing career that you're just on the move. I was out of home at sixteen.
You were a ballet dancer, is that right?
I was, so I auditioned and then I actually ran away kind of from the ballets to the Gold Coast. But I was still under eighteen at that point, so my mum and dad came and took me and brought me back home to Coughs. And you know, I wasn't eighteen, so I wasn't allowed to do anything until then anyway, so I had to sit around. But in that time, dance Encore gets a hold of me and says, guess
what we would love to have you. We know you're not turning eighteen till March, but we can put you in rehearsals in February and the beginning of March, and you can be on a plane to Japan the day after your eighteenth birthday.
The adventure begins, I know.
But then I had to convince mom and dad. I was like, come on, this is it like? Because I was still that means I was going to be seventeen in Sydney while myself and I'd just run away, you know, up the coast.
Did they let you do it? I assumed they did.
Yeah.
I somehow convinced them that it was what I wanted. And you know, I'm not going to ruin a job opportunity. It's different. I felt it would be different if I was going to be paid. You know, I'd be accountable, I'd be responsible, And I was, like, I have never worked. That company taught me determination and discipline way more than the ballet school did. Like I really learned to work my ass off in that company. Then I worked for them for two years, back and forth to Japan, and it was amazing.
It sounds like an incredible adventure for a young woman.
It was, and you know, it was not the dancing that I had in my head as a kid, but it was just it was a great adventure. And like I said, it just taught me so much. And then I came back and then I ended up doing Cats. I auditioned for Cats, and then I felt like more of a proper dancer, but I loved both just the same.
Just thinking about when I mean, we're going to obviously get to all this later, but when you choose a creative career, very few of us who choose creative careers
of all different kinds and necessarily driven by money. You know, if you were driven by money and the idea of stability, steady paychecks, regular increases, investment portfolios and stuff like, it's the wrong career to choose, Let's be honest, right, But one of the things when I talked to lots of midlife women now who sort of have realized later in life sometimes that, oh, like financial independence is so important.
Did you ever think about that kind of stuff or were you always chasing the adventure and the experience and the creativity.
Are always chasing the adventure. I definitely didn't think about that. I'm not like a material kind of girl. I don't think I have been. I think that's probably come from my parents. They're not like that. Well, we never had money to be like that, so you know, you kind of have forced to be that way. And no, I didn't. I just lived and I would work whatever other jobs I had to to keep afloat so I could keep that dream alive. So you know, I would wait. I
mean that's the main thing when you're a dancer. You learn how to wait tables, make coffee, do all of that. But then when I did get like Cats, I felt Cats was the best thing. Now we got seven hundred dollars.
A week, Yeah, you would have been like rich.
So rich, and then you also got your per diem and you're staying in these hotels all around. Well, we did Asia, and then all of Australia's saying in like great accommodation. You're getting this pa diem. You can live off the Pa dieum if you're smart, which I did, and so I felt like, yeah, I felt like I was winning at that point in my seven hundred dollars
a week. But then after Cats, I somehow sort of fell into acting, and then money kind of did become slightly more appealing because it blew like a whole week of really really hard work, eight shows a week, three hour shows. You know, that's a lot plus rehearsals, all for your seven hundred bucks, But then you go and do a TV commercial and you're there for two hours
and you get six grand. It sort of acting opened my eyes and probably, if I'm being really honest and truthful, I would say money certainly swayed me into the acting world.
I mean, obviously your life took lots of turns, but when you were sort of in a Hollywood adjacent period, did you have your head turned that you know how you were saying before, I've never been a materialistic person, and that's obvious that your values are not that right. It's obvious, and the choices you've made the way you live your life. Did you have your head turned when you were almost adjacent to that kind of big, glitzy world. Did it seem attractive then? Were you seduced by it at all?
In America?
Yeah?
Oh yeah. Look so my first proper acting job, you know, I did twenty three TV commercials from a dancer. I was taking some time off and I had an agent and I said to that agent, you know, I need a break, and she called like in a week in and said, hey, I've got an audition for you. And I was like, no, I need a rest, and she's like, no, it's an acting job. You just got to look longingly at a chip, like it's a KFC. You just got to look at a chip. And I was like, no,
I'm not an actor. And she's like, you just pretended to be a cap for two years, Yes you are. And it pays two grand. And I was like two grand for how long? They're two grand for maybe half a day if you're there that long. Anyway, I was like, okay, I'll do that. So I did all these TV commercials and they paid really really well. I did them for probably three years. But then anyway, Baywatch came to town. Yeah, and it was my first I've done sort of a
couple of little roles. I think i'd done water at anyway, a couple of little rolls, sort of one liners, not real scenes as such. Anyway, bay Watch came to town. I auditioned. That's a whole nother story. Bay Watching me was just bizarre.
But what a thing, Like, what a thing to come to town. You know, when you're I don't know if you relate to this or not, but you know we're similar. Now you look back at life and you go that decision, that job, that relationship, that moment, like the things that change your path, you can see them very clearly from where we're sitting now, right, and that obviously was one of those moments.
They were definitely changed the path that first audition. You know, I went in there. I was doing my TV commercials, but I was mainly working in the restaurants at that point in time, and you know, a bit of a night our partying. So I was lily white, short red hair. My agent's like, you're going to go in for this bay Watch audition. I was like, are you mental? Like no, no, And well I agreed, and then sure enough I get there everyone's you know, either blonde like the Kimberly.
Yes, Kimberly Davis is that what she was called as well, the two of them. Yeah, and that was very much an esthetic at that time. There was like a Pamela Anderson obviously the bay Watch connection, but a very blonde, beautiful, curvy.
Long haired, definitely beach babe, beach bod all of that. And then there was me. But for whatever reason, you know that Alexandra Paul who had been on the show prior, had the short hair. She was a bit boonboyish, you know, she was the different one she had left the show. So that's I guess how I got my start because they were looking for something just different. Yeah, no, so they was definitely put me on a different path. And when I got to Hawaii, they gave us a convertible.
I was at the Hilton Hawaiian Village with one hundred and eighty k Waikiki beach views. You go into the best parties, you people are giving you clothes, so you do get a little bit carried away with that kind of life. Like it was so new, it was so different. So I went from my seven hundred dollars, as you know as a dancer, and the commercials that paid well to Now this was minimum, but it was three grand US in ninety nine and your perdem and you accommodation again,
so that was huge. Our dollar was so weak at that point, so my three grand American was massive money to me. Massive.
So there are times in your life where you're like, I'm nailing it. And was that one? Did you love it? Did you love all that, the parties, the convertible, the glamour. Was that very exciting or did you quickly kind of go I don't know.
Yeah, both, I loved all of it. With Baywatch comes Baywatch, you know, and the stigma that's around a show like that. That acting wasn't good. I mean I learned so much so I would never ever slam it for that because it taught me all the things about camera angles and sizes and lighting and just learning lines. You know, I hadn't really done that before, so you know, it taught me a lot. But then there's also the other side of Baywatch, which was the weight.
Yeah. I was going to say, what was it like being in your cozi all the time? Did you feel pressure around other women?
Yeah? One hundred percent, And because the girls out there were absolutely extraordinary. I went in there the smallest I've ever been. I think I was weighing in it. This is horrible, forty five kilo and I'm five seven when I first got there. Because I was so paranoid before I went that, I just trained like nothing else and all eight was protein and I stripped down and I thought I was looking okay. But I look back at those first few episodes of Baywatch and I'm like so thin,
Like I couldn't see it in real life. But when I watched it back, it was also.
Though that nineties esthetic was tiny, right like sometimes when you look. But I mean, and I was watching TV at that time and very much immersed in that. It definitely, as I say, seems to have been a time when we decided that women needed to be absolutely tiny in that. With that, so you're in Hawaii, You're getting paid money that to you is like wow, and living the life.
There's a lot of shit that comes along with it, like not allowed to eat, but you're going to all the parties, you're meeting Hollywood stars and all the rest of it.
Then what happens, Well, look, I realized that all of that stuff wasn't really important. And you know, I got fired in the middle of Baywatch, so sorry. I know we said we weren't going to go down the PA that's fine, but I didn't fired in the middle of it because I refused to do a photo shoot that I just didn't think it was. I'd already done so much publicity for them and I used up my quota and I just put my foot down.
Anyway, What kind of photo shoot did they want you to do?
Look, it was for one of the men's magazines.
Which are massive then, like just for like I'm sure our listers will remember because they're grown ups, but those men's mags were huge at that time, right, huge.
And especially for Baywatch, Like there was going to be a cover. I think it was Maxim And I was really excited at first because I was like, oh, that's cool. But then I had in my head, Okay, we'll do a black and white shoot. It'll be with shears in a hotel room. Maybe there'll be a cigarette a bit suspenders, Like I'll make it. This could be amazing.
Sexy but tasteful.
You're thinking super tasteful but super sexy. I was like, this would be nice and I'm like, no, no, it's lingerie, but you'll be on the beach with the girls, a bit of a girl on girl, you know. Action. I've got nothing against that at all, and I certainly had nothing against my co stars, but I was just done
with all of that. Like, you know, we had to go to football games and basketball games in our swimsuits so they could be in the middle, you know, of the night, eight o'clock at night, and there we were in the middle going.
So they kind of treated the bay Watch actresses like models, cheerleaders, what do you call them? Promo girls like girl Yeah, which there's nothing wrong with that as a way to make a living, but that's not what you thought you were doing.
Yeah. I was just thinking, you know, I wanted to be taken what as serious as you could be taken on bait Watch and that sort of thing, especially when I'd done what my con tracked had already, you know, I'd done my quota. I didn't want to be doing any more of those, and so I just stood my ground and.
It didn't go down.
Well, it's just backfired. But I'm so stubborn. I'm so stubborn. They were, like they called me in and they said you have to do it, and I said, I'll be as sexy as you like, but please, can we do it like in a hotel. I don't want to do the girl on girl. I don't want to do that, and I don't want to do it on beach, and don't want to do it in like underwear on a beach,
wet lingerie on a beach. So it's just yuck. And they were like, Noah, this is what you're doing and I said, well, I'm not so and they said, okay, we we're sending you home. You're fired.
More of my conversation with Simone after this shortbreak, so again, we could be here all day. Because your life is very interesting. So you've got this level of success. You know, you're going in Hollywood movies, you had a famous boyfriend at this time. Then you do come back to Australia and you're on Mcloud's Daughters, which is one, as I said before, it's in the cannon of one of the most loved Ossie TV shows ever.
Right for sure?
Was it amazing to be on it at the time?
Absolutely, I mean I definitely had moments in la and in America where I felt like especially that movie in Lithuania. I felt like, oh, I'm a proper actress now. But then I did some big grade movies too that made me go okay. But then when I came back to McLeod's, you know, i'd never seen the show because I'd been in America, and they flew me back for the second audition.
So I did a self tape in America, and the second audition was back here in Australia, and they gave me six or seven episodes to watch in the hotel before I was to do this, and I was like, oh, no, these guys are amazing, like amazing, amazing. How am I going to do this? Like I'm not a trained actor. I looked at a chip once and then next thing, you know, I'm here.
You know I looked at the chip once and now I mean.
That's how when like it just pure And so that made me really really nervous because the standard, you know, the actors who were the nier people were Briety and Aaron there, and you know, they all trained and amazing, and I did feel very uncertain about the second audition. But luckily they put me on a horse and I grew up with horses, right, I mean, I'd never hit a mark before on a horse. I was comfortable cantering in on a horse, and my character had to be
really comfy. So I think my audition wasn't great. My first audition was, but the second one wasn't so great. But because I nailed it on the horse anyway, Yes, McCloud's was amazing for me to be now with these actors that were so talented, to be working with animals, to be back in Australia, like all of those things. The last couple of years in America mem X were like out in a caravan again. Caravan we moved out
of LA. He wasn't an LA kind of person either, so we'd been living in an airstream out there in the middle of Valencia, and we've sort of been away from all the big material things anyway. But for me to be back and be on home to family could come and visit, doing this extraordinary show with these amazing people was just the biggest gift ever.
So interesting that you know you are originally from country Australia, I guess, and then you're on the most iconic regional country show.
Yeah.
I don't want to push on this too much because I know it's personal. But I have seen a post of yours that you put up once of you were in a wedding dress on the side of McCloud's you're filming the wedding scene, but you actually were going through personal heartbreak at the time. I think you and your axe had just broken up. Ah.
Yes, well I didn't break up. He left and he left very very suddenly. And you know, I'd been an anxious person sometimes, you know, nerves can totally get the best of me when it comes to auditions. If it's something really important, you know, the nerves can just completely derail, like I can't think, I can't do anything, and that's normal. But when he left, it catapulted me into a world of anxiety that I didn't know existed, and it opened
the door to panic attacks. So he left the end of November two thousand and six.
And you were like, you were a long distance at this point, so correct, And you're contracted to be in a tiny town in South Australia dealing with this from afar, which must have been very like discombobulating on a million levels.
Yeah, well, he flew into break up with me, I guess. So he did do it face to face, but it came out of the blue because I was leaving Mcloud's. I'd given my notice we were about to be married. You know, we were talking baby names, my world. I thought I knew what my world was. And here's my character playing she's going to be a bride. So all this good stuff's happening for my character, it's happening for me in my mind as well. You know, I'll be
written out of the show. This would have been an amazing four years, but I'm going off to live my life. He turns up, leaves with no explanation, and I have to go. The very first thing I do on the Monday. Can you believe he left on the Friday? The very first thing I had to do that Monday was try on Stevie's wedding dress, the very first thing. I don't really remember it from the moment he left. I think I just drank myself into a bit of a stupor
the entire weekend. Don't think I ate much anyway. They take me and I'm a mess. I can't even stand. I'm just crying. I'm sobbing, and they're just going to hold me up trying to fit this wedding dress. So I've never even tried my real wedding dress on. I hadn't bought one.
You know.
It was going to be a beach wedding, so it wasn't going to.
Be any but still it was all there in your mind. What was going to happen.
Yeah, I'd never tried any wedding dress on. I'd never played a bride, so this was the first time ever. He just left and here I am trying to put this dress on. Anyway, I didn't from that moment though. They did hold me up and I had to go to set. Only had one scene to do that first day on that Monday, and I just stopped. I shut it off, and I didn't cry again at work. They
flew my family in immediately, which was amazing. So I had my little niece, who was maybe two or three three at the time, at home with me, and my sister was there, you know. So I didn't cry at work, I didn't cry at home. But a couple of weeks went by with this somehow held within. I'm playing the giddy bride, so I'm going the opposite while I'm at work.
But then one day I'd had a dream, walked into the makeup bus and one of my co stars just said, oh, you look better, and I was like, yeah, I feel good. I had a dream. I told him where to go, feeling really confident, and the second I did it, my world just like collapsed but imploded at the same time. I didn't know what was happening. I couldn't move. All I could hear was people around me saying you're right or you're right, But I was just I was frozen.
It's completely and utterly frozen, but I believe I was breathing really, really heavily. Anyway, they quickly rushed got the medic to come in, and that was the first panic attack that I'd ever had, and it came from just that little tiny bit of joy that I had from, you know, telling him off in my dream. In my subconscious it was crazy. And so that photo Stevie, my character was shooting the wedding. So everything I did from friggin' moment that he left was all Stevie's happiness and joy.
So of course the wedding itself was going to be a hurdle. Everybody knew it. You know, these panic attacks had started, so knew that they would come, and they'd come randomly, you never knew, but we assumed that the bowls were probably going to be the worst. But I somehow got through the vows. Don't know it, got it. But then and then there was the wedding, the first dance, and it's just massive. It was as nearly as big as the first one. I think it was a huge,
huge panic attack. And then that was the aftermath. So I was sitting in the dining room in the big old house and my makeup artist Jodie was just trying to put me back together, and of course I'd had them for a bit. Now everyone was not so panicked anymore.
We knew that they came and they were horrible, but then they did go, and the release, like I felt quite good after them, because all of this energy is somehow it's gone for a second and you go into this really horrible, scary place, but then there's this there's such relief after it's passed.
People who haven't experienced panic attacks are always very shocked at how physical they are. You know, people frequently think they're having a heart attack, that there's something very serious happening, and seeing somebody out of context that happening to them is very scary. When we were just talking before about the moment you look back on and you go, well,
that was a turn, and that was a turn. So that sort of culmination of Mcloud's and sort of clashing into this big breakup and also clashing into a mental health crisis, I imagine that is kind of the start of another chapter, right.
Yeah, yeah, definitely, it was. Well, it was the big end of a life that I thought I was going to have and then it was. It opened up a different kind of world, this anxiety world that I then had to contend with. I mean, it did sort of pass down there. They became less frequent, especially after the wedding was kind of done and dusted. But other things can trigger them these days, and so more recently, you know, financial stress is kind of the thing.
It's interesting because a lot of the women who listen to this show, you know, their stories won't involve Hollywood stars and you know, being on the beach in their knickers and shooting weddings, but the themes are similar, right, like the things that can derail your life. There's confidence, there's mental health, there's romantic breakdowns, there's all these things. It is actually very relatable because then you're there going okay, well now what and then you become a single mom.
Now yeah, look, so it all happens for a reason, right mindsight, like, I'm so glad that he left, because I wouldn't have Mads if you know, I had stayed in that relationship, if I had.
Gone to America, like, oh god, I just wouldn't want to be in America anyway.
Well, no, not at the moment for sure. So your life as single mom, as Mads as mom, how has that And obviously did you consciously leave acting behind or did it leave you a little bit or was that a very conscious decision that like, okay, it's time to change how things are going.
Yeah, look, I definitely decided to put my hand down. So Madigan was born on my thirty seventh birthday, and I went down and I think he was only three months old. I did a little stint on city homicide, which was fine. It was only a few days though, it was just a little guesty. That was okay. But then when he was around two, I went and did neighbors and I did neighbors for about three months and
the set days. Like when you're working on a show, any show, sometimes you can be there twelve fourteen hours a day. And that's how it was when I was on Neighbors. You know, you work for a really they crushed their scenes. You did all your scenes kind of in one day, and then they'd be rehearsals and whatnot. So even though I was there for three months, some weeks, I was only maybe working the one day, but in that day, I was away for the entire day. I'd leave in the dark, I'd be home in the dark,
and Madigan just didn't understand. And I just after that gig, I just thought, you know, I'm the age that I am. I don't have a partner, the chances of me having another baby are very very slim. I don't want to miss a moment. It was then that I sort of said to my agents that I don't really think this is for me at the moment. I really just want
to enjoy this with my little boy. I was in Cough's Tarbots, so you know, I'm removed from the acting world and all of that anyway, So I just said, no, let's just leave it for now.
After this short break, I'm going to be back with Simone Jade McKinnon to hear about how things came full circle for Simone, but not quite in the way she'd planned. And this brings us back to the little house that you bought, that you told us about. So after McCloud's you bought a house back in Coff. She moved back to be near your family. And then after a few years there and I imagine circumstances changed. We move back to the paddock.
We move, yeah, we get the caravan. We set off on our lap around Australia. But my dad, who has been battling cancer since two thousand and seven, not battling the whole time, sorry, living with cancer. Yeah, he got really sick. So I'd only been on the road for six months. Here we are in the caravan, we're in cans and he wants me to come back, and I'm like, oh, okay, it's a long drive, but I'd rather come back now, you know, than if we're over in wa. You know,
it's a lot bigger hall to get home. So I was like, this is perfect. We'll come home for Christmas anyway. Set up in the paddock, the paddock that I used to ride my horses in out of Bonvog was five acres. It's nothing big, it's nothing grand. And so there I was in the caravan in the paddock and he asked me to subdivide the land for him. He's like, I'd rather subdivide it now. The councilor had just given approval. I'd rather subdivide it now and have you kids get
a little bit of your inheritance now. That'll help you all out. And so I was like, okay, sure, how long would this possibly take a few months? I thought? Two years later, still in the paddock, full time in the caravan, not moving and it's.
Like, oh, what are you living on at this point, Like, what's work like for you at this time? Work? Yeah? Were you working?
No? So I came back. I was his care for a while, yes, because he was so sick. So I did get some money from that. You know, I'd sold the house, so I had money in the bank, so I wasn't allowed I sent a link or anything like that.
Yeah because you had savings.
Yeah, yeah, because I had my savings. So that was a choice I decided. I knew that I was going to spend money to do this lap, but it was something I was happy to do because it was the bucket list dream that I wanted.
Was the six months that you did get to do? Was it the dream?
It was part of the dream Queensland.
So but was it wonderful being on the road like that?
To you a math Oh my god, it was the best. It was the best. It was hard because I was homeschooling him, like kindergarten. You think that KINDI would be the easiest, but it's not. Kindergarten is the base of all their schooling and he had a speech delay, so it was really hard. That was the worst part of it. Like I loved doing it all myself. I took him to the Tip Wow Tip of New South I was. I dragged a twenty four foot caravan by myself that whole way.
Croc country, red dirt.
Dirt like we loved it. Madigan loved it. The dogs loved it. We didn't love the crocodiles because that made it hard. But just being on the road and you know, the physical work, I didn't mind at all. I loved driving, so that wasn't a problem. And yeah, we were just we were absolutely living our best life while we were on the road. I just think I was born to do it.
Yeah, well, you know, there's plenty of time. We'll get to that. So then you come home, you're looking after your dad ad Mads and living on the proper, and then what happened.
So then Poppy pulls the rug out from under my feet a little bit and he goes, well, so I'm about to sell the land for him and me and Mad's he's feeling better, and I'm like, perfect, we're going again. And then Poppy goes, actually, I'm not going to sell it to anyone. You're going to have to take it. I don't want it, no offense, but I don't really want to live next door to my dad. I mean, I got out of Coff's Harbor when I was sixteen
for a reason. I didn't want to be here. It was good while Madigan was little, but you know, I wanted out anyway. He's a stubborn I get the stubbornness from him. From him or and once he put his foot down, I truly believed him that he wasn't going to he wasn't going to sell it to anybody else. But may so I'll like, okay, well I've got the cash I've got a bit of cash from the house. Yeap, from the house, I'll pay up my brother and sister and I'll use the land. I'll build a shed on
it and I'll use it as my base. That sounds like a great plan.
So the land you're living on now is yours.
It is actually mine. Yes, it's two and a half acres and it is the paddic that we used to write our in.
That's so interesting because I mean, I know you were saying that isn't what you wanted, but what a story to come back there to raise your boy after all these after Hawaii and Gaula and Sydney and Japan. Yeah, it's wild.
I know the place that I couldn't wait to get out of though I'm stuck in now.
Is there something beautiful about it or not? Or do you have to really reach for the something beautiful about it?
You have to reach for the same I think you know the reason of all the stress and the mental issues was because I was forced into this situation. I would have decided it for myself, that's one thing, and then you live with your decision. But I kind of felt like I was forced into it, and that's the thing that I've battled with because it's not a bad thing to be forced into. But it has changed change my life because the I haven't been able to continue
the lap and live out my dream. I don't have the cash to do it anymore either.
Because you've spent it on the land.
Well, spend it on the land and then anything else has now gone into this small business.
So so you've started a small business. It's clothing, and I have to say it's very you. I was looking at the website earlier on is that the big dream? Like is that where you see yourself going no, you're shaking your head another.
I honestly did it.
So it's called Wandering Ossie. By the way, everybody Wandering Ossy thank you.
For the shout out. Yes, Wandering Ozzy. Well, I went under the name Wandering Ossy when I first sold up because I was like, oh, this is cool. Maybe I can, you know, do a little YouTube channel. I did start one, and you know, I'll document my travels. Maybe there's a way I can make some money as I go. Kind of That's what I thought back in twenty sixteen, and then twenty nineteen I did take off again and I was working as a jill aru.
Yeh, which this blows my mind because I'm just imagining people going our Jillarue is Stevie from McCloud's daughter.
And it all happened by chance, Like my whole life is just this chance after chance that I've just been really lucky and really fortunate that they've come up. And then also I've had the balls to just go yeah, why not. And this family that lived up at Rockhampton. I did a charity event in Tamworth with riding these cutting horses, which is amazing. And then they said to me,
why don't you come up. This is twenty nineteen. Why don't you come up and work at our station and we'll teach you to do what you used to pretend to do on Mcloud's daughters. We'll teach you for real. And I was like sure. Like I didn't get paid, so it was just food and accommodation. We're all covered, so it was just for the experience, and I was
there for only three months. Unfortunately, the drought hit and it was a really bad time for the family, so I couldn't stay as long as I had planned to stay. But from there I went up in far North Queensland, and I kind of went, oh, there's enough interest in me doing this that I think I could do both the lap and the jillarooing at the same time document it as well. I just want a property, hop my way around and get paid like a jillarou is really
low wage, especially starting from the bottom. I'm sure the good station hands in all of those they'd probably get great money, but when you're the shit kicker as I was, it's really basic money. But I didn't care. I was like, that could be an amazing thing for me. But then
the pandemic hit twenty nineteen, everything was great. I had some station work lined up for early twenty twenty pandemic You're not going north and I had a station in Tazzi our second wave hit Victoria not going that way, and then I was like, oh, what am I going to do? I need to do something. I'm stuck here. I've got the shed in the caravan, but what am I going to do? And then with the wandering title,
I just thought, you know, I've always sown. I've made I made Logi dresses when I was back doing the Logis. I've always been creative in that way, and so I thought, well, maybe I can just do something along those lines while I'm stuck here. And I knew that there'd be McLeod's fans out there. I did. My logo was a cowgirl, kind of a gypsy cowgirl. I had my dreadlocks, so it was like a cow girl and a gypsy collide. And I knew that they would get a kick out
of that, and they did. You know. The hoodies and T shirts went quite quickly, and then the pandemic just kept going. So I was like, Okay, well I'll do something else, and here we are, like what four years later, and I'm still going with it.
Can I ask you about the pressure of being a single mom? And I know that actually looking at Wondering Hossie, you actually give a little bit of money from all your sales to a single mom's organization, right, so you're really passionate about supporting single moms. Yeah, Can you explain a little bit about the pressure of how it feels to be the sort of single point of failure for your family? And when I say single point of failure,
that sounds wrong. I'm not suggesting in any way your failure, but the pressure of knowing if I don't do it, it's not going to happen. If I don't put food on the table, it's not going to be there, if I don't secure things, you know, for maths like that is a pressure that is a lot to live with, right, Yes.
It certainly is. Like any single parent, male or female, you know, it's it's a really it's a tough gig. But I always say that, you know, with all the stress and the money and all of that, you also get double the love, double the hugs, double the everything.
So for me, it's been a really wonderful ride. As stressful as it has been, I know I'm fortunate though too, Like I do have a block of land here, I've got a caravan and I've got a shed, and that's a lot more than many many other single mums or dads have, Especially now now it's horrible.
What have you learned about how to? I mean, maybe you didn't have to learn because, as you said at the beginning, you're not a very materialistic person, but the logistics of living between a sad and a caravan, Like, what have you learned? It's easy to go without? Like, what's your sort of philosophy? On what you actually need, you guys, to be the happy family unit that you clearly are very tight.
Yeah, well, look we don't have there's no heating or cooling in this shed. This is a big black shed too. So summertime, this thing is hot. Wintertime it's freezing. It's cement flows, so you know, we just go without. You put the fans on when it's hot, and then wintertime we rug up like I've always got I mean, my hair's growing out at the moment too, so that's another reason for the bandanna, but always got a beanie on and just you just got to lay out, so we
go without things like that. You know that money can go towards an adventure of some sort Madigan, you know, I want him to grow up thinking that kind of thing. And he like he laughs at the fact that he's a kmart kid. That's what you know, it's I think it's cute, like of course, like he's he understands already. I mean, he's got a PlayStation, so you know, there are some things that I definitely want him to, you know, not feel like he's getting left behind. But he also
knows that you don't need all that. He loves the shed. He thinks the shed's great.
It actually looks really good from what I can see.
I'm showing you a good part.
I've got a corrugated roof on my house too, so I know about the noise, but you're doing very well with it. Let's just get to the Summit, because I heard when you were going on that show. So anyone who hasn't watched The Summit, right, there are some shows that I love to watch with my kids. Family TV
is a thing, right. I used to turn my nose up at those kind of shows, but now there's nothing I love more than being on the couch and we watch Survivor and we watch both seasons at the Summit, and you were on it.
The physical pain has been the lentless from listers to sore shoulder.
And as much as my heart is telling me to keep going, where I am really struggling to catch my breath, like I don't know if there's a panic attack that I'm feeling coming on.
I can see your hands shaking. I loved you from the minute you came on because obviously I know who you are. Of course I do. I'm very familiar with mcclouds and all the culture of the tea. I used to work at TV week at one time, and you were a big deal there, I can tell you. So obviously I knew you were, but there was something very relatable to me about you on that show. You were very honest about your circumstances. You were very clear about the fact, I'm here to make some money for my family.
My dream is to build a shared house on your property. You seemed overwhelmed at the beginning. You seemed insecure at the beginning. You were like, what am I doing here? Who are all these big personalities? I don't even know? And yet you were spoiler friends, one of the last three, and you walked away with some money, not as much as, in my opinion, you should have walked away with. But you get paid to go on it.
Right, No, as a show like that, some contestants might get paid, but on a reality show like that, you don't get paid.
So the prize money is the reward and that's it, right, Okay, and obviously expensive.
Yeah, yeah, but definitely people can get paid for in general terms. No, a show like that, you go on there, I mean it's two weeks, fifteen days of your life, so you know it's a good gamble.
Was that experience terrifying?
Well, look, they asked me, and then I said, yes, Okay, let's do it. But then I went back and rewatched season one again as an actual contestant, and I was like, oh shit, that actually looks a lot harder. And it was really close to the shooting date, and so there was no time. I'd lost on my hair earlier that year, so I hadn't been to the gym, I was pretty unfit, and all of a sudden, it all kind of came to me in a real sense of what I was
going to have to do. But I was still thinking at that point only about the physical side of it, and potentially the emotional side of it, being away from Madigan, because I had never been away from him ever. We've never not spoken, and I knew that once you get on the mountain there was no communication whatsoever. And I knew that that was going to play with my brain
a lot of my emotions. What I didn't realize was because I had been in this really dark place and I'd lost all my hair and i'd been in hiding that you know you're there and the next thing you're with all these people that you don't know from a bar of soap. They're all very big personalities. And then you've got cameras, although you know, the cameras do try
and keep away a little bit. So you're kind of in this little bubble on the mountain with these random people and they've got their big personalities, and everyone's trying to get their five minutes of fame and their views across, and they want to be the alpha and everything. And I wasn't prepared for that kind of environment. I wasn't prepared for the cameras. Again, I didn't think about it.
I didn't think it through, and I wasn't prepared for all the big personalities that seem to be very very comfortable in front of I should have been the one comfortable in front of the king.
Yeah.
Interesting, I've been okay, but I wasn't okay, and I just well, I didn't speak like I'm glad that you could sort of see what was happening to me.
You walk away with one hundred thousand, it's.
All right, thousand, yeah, which is better than nothing, So better than nothing?
What have you done with the money, And tell me how you're feeling now post that post coming out of this place you've been in about what's next and what are the plans?
Right, Well, certainly the one hundred thousand is enough to take the pressure off a little bit. It's not enough to build. So this shed here that we spend a lot of time in isn't a livable space.
It's not a proper house.
It's not a proper house, and it's not a legal house. I'm not allowed to live in it. It's legal shed, and I can work out of it the businesses here, everything's fine, but it can never and can never be sold as a residence. So the only option I'd have to build another. And I love the shed. I love what I did here, so I know that I could build another one and do it quite cheaply. In my head, I thought I could do it for about two hundred grand.
There would be a lot of work. That wouldn't be a good kitchen, that wouldn't be good bathrooms, but you know I could get the bones up. I can't do that with one hundred thousand. There's just no way. So unfortunately it's a bit boring. I've got dead of course, Yeah, the money will go that way. And then right now, I'm feeling quite confident. I feel like I'm going to be able to do a bit of the lap. I know, I can't leave my dad for very long.
So your dad is still with us, and he's still unwell.
He's still just living with cancer. Yeah, that he's on his own. So I'm still I'm not a paid care anymore, but I certainly am his person from you know, technology, like he doesn't have a mobile file a computer. You know, I've got to help him with his smart TV, and.
So you are caring for him, not in a medical but yes, yeah.
And I cook for him, you know, probably three or four nights a week, but I don't get paid for it. So of course I know that we could get something in place there. And so the plan is now, if I can pay these debts off, I don't have that to build the other shed house shouts, so that just has to sit on the back burner now for god knows how long. But what I could do is put
a bit more money into the business. This is the plan while that stock is being made, because it takes a while, Mad's and I could hit the road for a little bit, like it's not that's probably not the best financial idea I've had, But life is it's too short. Like I've got four years left with Madigan in the house. So if I don't do that now while I've got a bit of cash to do it, I won't get to do it if we just sit here and wait until he's eighteen.
Yeah, this is the thing is that you It sounds to me. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but your values are you want to spend time with your kid, you want to make memories and have adventures and go to a place you want to go.
Well, we can't.
Those things are not free, because nothing is. But their choices you can make that are more meaningful perhaps than some others.
Well that's what I believe. I believe if we don't do it now, who knows what's around the corner, you know. And I want him just to have the best start in life. And I just don't believe sitting here going to a school. I would rather have the adventure and set him on a path that could just open up all the doors for him. People who sometimes just get stuck in one place, you know, you think that's your life,
That's how it's got to be. By doing this with him now and showing him and telling him like the way I've lived my life, because he says, oh, you know what if I just finished school and then what am I going to do after that? Am I just going to go to the same job, do the same thing day after day? And I'm like, no, look at my life, look at what I've done. You can spin and pivot at any point if you really want to, if you're not financially driven.
I guess, yeah, for sure, we've probably been talking too long. I'm sure my producer would say so. But I have two things I really want to ask you before we
wrap up. The first is about you said before you know, it's a fact actually that the fastest group of people becoming homeless of women in their midlife, right, And I know that to a certain extent, the way that you're living is a choice, but it's also an affordable way for you to be able to live your life how you want to live it, through your work with single parents community and so to. Have you heard about a lot of people who are really struggling in that circumstance.
Oh, look, they're always struggling, but they're even more so now because of the housing crisis. I mean, it's so hard. I mean, I don't know how else to help other than to get word out, Like my business doesn't do enough to be able to give much. I've had some amazing customers though, who have donated to the Single Mums and their Children charity that I work with, and I know every little bit helps, but it's just really hard.
I don't know what we need to do as a community, but we need to do something because you can't have people out on the streetlight that. You can't have single mums out on the street missing.
Meals, kids living in cars.
Kids living in cars. You know. I after the first year of starting Wandering, I was either first year was okay, but then the second year was not. And you know, there was times in that year. I mean, I have to go without heat and air con. That's just what I have to do to get by. But there was a time that I was like, oh my god, medication
am I going to be able to afford that? I was faced with it too, and I called to Rees, who's the head of that charity, and I was like, I, look, I'm not going to be able to do much because I'm actually now one of the people that I wanted to help, Like, I'm actually that person deciding if I should get my medication or not. So yeah, it's just hard. It's really hard, and I just wish there was something more I could do.
It sounds like you know, as you say, getting the word out and doing what you're doing through wandering Aussie is definitely helping because people don't think enough about what everyone's going through. The other thing I really wanted to ask you is for a woman who's listening to this who feels like she's at one of those moments where all the plans have fallen a heap. You've been through a few of them, as we've discussed today, all the
plans have fallen in a heap. She's got responsibilities, she's got no idea what life's going to look like in a few months or a year. Midlife can bash your confidence, as we've discussed, have you got words of wisdom?
Like?
What gets you through?
I warned you at the beginning there's no wisdom here.
I think there's wisdom. How the hell have you got through some of those things?
Oh? You know what? I reckon? It goes back to being a dancer and an actor as well. Because there's a lot of knockbacks in both of those worlds, and you have to become very resilient and you have to take the knocks and you have to get back up. Otherwise what is there? Like I did it for years as a dancer, you know, I go for twenty auditions and maybe I'll get one. As an actor, it was way worse, So go for one hundred auditions and maybe get one. So you kind of get used to being
knocked down. And then as a single parent, you know, you've got the added weight. I don't know, You've just got to You just got to keep fighting.
And I guess what some people have said is that you never know what's going to happen next, you know what I mean, Like life throws you some bizarre curveballs sometimes. I mean, that's a cliche, but it's true.
It's so true. And that's why I keep wanting to live life, you know, because nothing is certain. I just want to live the best life that I possibly can while I'm here, and I wanted to do as much as I possibly can with my son and give him the best start. It's a life. I told you there was no wisdom, no if that is wisdom.
Look at you, it is wisdom. Oh, thank you so much.
Oh thank you.
Look. I need to tell you about Simone, even though she just did an excellent job of telling you about herself. She recorded that with us from her shed on the mid North coast of New South Wales, as the rain pelted down on a tin roof and her son played with the rescue dogs.
On the floor.
For a woman who's been through such a lot, her beauty and her very open energy just kind of pomped through the camera. And we did video that conversation. We always do video them, but we had a tech problem, which meant you're not going to see it, And I'm sorry about that, but I could have talked to her for a week. We talk about living a life full of stories, and I'm not sure there's a clearer example
than that conversation. We just had a midwoman who's refusing to give up on the life she wants, no matter how hard it is. I just loved it. I'm always really energized by talking to people about the things that light them up, and what lits the mo own up was definitely her son and the time and the adventures that she wants to have with him, and I totally get it. Times ticking away, I feel like as your kids are growing up and you're like, but there's so much I want to do with you before you fly
the nest. Friends, please remember to scroll back in this feed to hear more stories of overcoming remarkable stuff, like my conversation with Julie Goodwin about mental health and the moment her life was saved by a couple of strangers and their puppy, or with Christine Arnau, who spoke to me about rebuilding herself after divorce and facing up to the parts we all play in the moments that derail us.
Just enormous. Thanks to you mids for embracing our show and to the team who helped put it together, led by our amazing executive producer Nama Brown and including sound design from Tom Lyon and production from Telisa Bizzazz. Go and follow us, Share this episode with a friend, throw us alike. It means the world. I'll see you here next week for a conversation about rage. I know you feel it too. I'll see you back here