On this episode of The Bespoke Parenting Podcast, host Julie Gunlock interviews Cathy Holman, a Wyoming mom of five, social media influencer, radio host, blogger, and marketing expert, who also runs her own website PrairieWifeInHeels.com. Julie and Cathy discuss her “joyfully chaotic” life, how faith helps her live and parent her children with “grit and grace,” and how making (sometimes difficult) choices is key to staying happy and fulfilled.
TRANSCRIPT
Julie Gunlock:
Hey everyone, I’m Julie Gunlock, host of the Bespoke Parenting Podcast. For those new to the program, this podcast is focused on how parents should custom tailor their parenting style to fit what’s best for their families themselves, and most importantly, their kids.
Okay folks, for all of you Yellowstone fans out there today, I have a treat for you. No. No, I’m not interviewing the lovable yet psychotic Beth Dutton. Instead, I have someone much better. Today I’m talking to Cathy Holman, better known as Prairie Wife. Hey, Cathy.
Cathy Holman:
Good morning. Thank you so much for having me. I am so excited to chat with you.
Julie Gunlock:
I am so excited you’re here. And before I give your intro, I do have to tell people it’s so exciting to actually see… Okay, my dog. Can you hear the bells? I actually have to get up and let my dog in.
Cathy Holman:
If there’s one thing I can relate to it’s that.
Julie Gunlock:
I have the Christmas bells on my door, so you might have heard that too. Before I get to your bio, I do want to say it’s really exciting because I feel like we’ve known each other for years. I feel like we’re good friends. I’ve never met you in person.
Cathy Holman:
No.
Julie Gunlock:
We actually got to know each other through Twitter, and I’ve been following you for a lot of years. But really, this is actually the first time that we’ve seen each other face-to-face.
Cathy Holman:
So I am so excited for this conversation. I have no idea where it’s going to end up going, but it’s going to be good.
Julie Gunlock:
It’ll almost be as good as an episode of Yellowstone, right?
Cathy Holman:
Yes, but a little less alcohol. And I do not think guns will be involved.
Julie Gunlock:
And we’re both wearing turtlenecks.
Cathy Holman:
We are.
Julie Gunlock:
Unlike Dutton who’s never worn a turtleneck. Okay, so Cathy is better known as Prairie Wife. She is a city girl gone country, I love this, all for the love of a cowboy. She began prairiewifeinheels.com, make sure you go there and check it out, in 2013 to spread her message of living a life of grit and grace. I love that. On her website, she shares stories of her joyful, chaotic life in the Wyoming prairie. She includes very honest and very funny posts about creating a life she loves, on parenting. She talks about parenting her five children and she gives them behind the scenes looks at brand development. But mostly Cathy is so stylish, but she’s very relatable. That’s why I like her website and love following her on all social media channels. So again, Cathy, welcome to the podcast.
Cathy Holman:
Thank you. I am absolutely thrilled to be sharing a little bit of my Wyoming life with you and all your listeners.
Julie Gunlock:
Well, listen, this is a podcast about doing your best and not listening to all the negative messages out there about, oh my gosh, your children, they don’t eat their vegetables on the dinner plate. Or oh my gosh, you actually fed them a frozen pizza. So this is sort of a podcast saying like, look, get through the day. Get through the day and do it the way that’s best for you. And I know that’s similar to your message, but I do like to ask people and you may not have a style, I sort of combine a couple of different parenting styles. But if you were to characterize your parenting style, and I ask this of all parents who come on, what would that be?
Cathy Holman:
I think that the one that would be most associated with how my husband and I raise our children is free range parenting.
Julie Gunlock:
Love it. That’s me.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah.
Julie Gunlock:
That’s me. And then if there was a parenting style called yelling, I would have to add that in.
Cathy Holman:
I’m going to have to agree with that just because there’s five of them. They scatter into different directions, so I have to yell in order to get the one I need.
Julie Gunlock:
Right, right, right. All right, so let’s go back to the beginning. How did you become a city girl in Wyoming?
Cathy Holman:
So when I was 13 years old, my family, I originally grew up in Milwaukee and my family was very poor. My dad started his own business and it took decades before it took off. So the one family vacation we ever went on was to Yellowstone for a family reunion. So we were up in Cody, Wyoming and it was about day two. And I was standing out there in the middle of nowhere, Yellowstone to one side cliffs on the other. And I just looked at my dad and I said, “This is where I want to live.” And he patted me on the head and was like, “Okay.” I had never peed outside. I had no concept of anything that involved living in Wyoming. We can get to that story later.
And so when it came time for college, I paid my own way. Again, my parents didn’t have money so I applied to the University of Wyoming and because I was paying my way, my parents had to just go with it. So site unseen, because I didn’t have money to travel to campus and visit. I hadn’t been back to Wyoming since I was 12. I didn’t know anyone. I arrived at the University of Wyoming, actually at the age of 17 because I skipped a grade. So I was young. My dad had 24 hours where he could be away from work. So he got me a bank account and gave me a kiss. And I haven’t left since other than short visits back home. So I’ve been here, I’m 40 now, so what is the math? 23 years now I’ve lived in Wyoming.
Julie Gunlock:
That is amazing. And honestly, it’s interesting that you employ the free range parenting style when in a way you had to do it on your own. You were of launched at such a young age and, well obviously you were able to take care of yourself. But it’s interesting because I think kids are not equipped these days and we can get into that. But I just find that connection really interesting. You talk about living, I mentioned it in your bio, with grace and grit. What does that mean?
Cathy Holman:
So that was something and a concept that I slowly developed through the need of just getting up each day and doing all the things. So we’ve mentioned that I have five kids, there’s three boys, two girls, and there’s only about two years in between each of them. So toddler to baby, toddler to baby for a decade straight. And during that time my husband was actually gone five days a week working.
Julie Gunlock:
Oh!
Cathy Holman:
It’s one of those things that’s really normal in Wyoming. We don’t have a lot of industry and so a lot of family members have to travel for long lengths of time, whether it’s 10 days on, 10 days off in the oil industry. So in that process, when I had my second kid is when he moved me out to what I call the middle of nowhere. For Wyoming, it is definitely not. For the rest of the world, we’re 20 minutes from town. We have 10 acres. Middle of nowhere applies.
Julie Gunlock:
Wow.
Cathy Holman:
So just waking up as a city girl and going out pregnant or with a two year old and a baby literally strapped to me to go break ice in the winter to hay the horses, to take care of the chickens. A varying number of pigs and cattle depending on what time. So just learning how to do that and not curl up in a little ball. Some of those days is where I came up with that concept of grit and grace. You got to just dig in. You’ve got to do it. But you have to give grace to yourself on the days that you can’t do it as well as you want to.
Julie Gunlock:
I think about you having a child. I have stair steps too. I have three, three boys and I have to say sometimes I think it would be nice to have a girl. And so I love your mix because I think that’s so lovely to have both.
Cathy Holman:
Pros and cons to both, let me tell you.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah, everybody’s like, oh yeah, you wish you had a girl, uh-huh. But well they each have their challenges, right?
Cathy Holman:
Absolutely.
Julie Gunlock:
And I’m not sure I would make it out alive with a teenage girl, so maybe God blessed me with just the boys.
Cathy Holman:
Boys are hormonal too.
Julie Gunlock:
Oh, that’s true.
Cathy Holman:
Seriously.
Julie Gunlock:
I mean honestly, Cathy, we could talk about this the whole time literally. I have one tween and then two teens, so I’m at the beginning of it, and whoo, it is different. But I think about, and I’d like your opinion on this. I think about what women complain about these days. It seems like a lot of people spend a lot of time complaining about their lives, about parenting, about the things that they have to do to get through the day. And then I think about you. Your husband’s not there and you’re having to strap a baby on your chest and put another one probably on the back and go out and it’s very little house on the prairie.
Cathy Holman:
Put the pitchfork down. Put the pitchfork down. That has actually been words that I’ve had to say.
Julie Gunlock:
Yes. I mean what do you think about our culture today, our parenting culture today, where there’s so much judgment, there’s this sort of narrative that it’s so hard.
Cathy Holman:
Mommy needs a glass of wine, right?
Julie Gunlock:
Yes. Tell me about how you react to that kind of stuff.
Cathy Holman:
So honestly, that’s one of the reasons why I started the blog. At the time my fourth child was nine months old and in Wyoming we’re isolated. I will literally go two or three days without driving into town, especially now that I’m no longer working, because we’ll go buy groceries for two weeks at a time. That’s just how we roll here. So it’s very isolated. And when I began my parenting journey almost 17 years ago, there wasn’t FaceTime. Facebook was just starting to be a thing. And so once a week I made the deal, okay, I’m going to go into town and I’m going to go to storytime or I’m going to go to a La Leche league meeting or I’m going to go to a mom’s group. Because I knew I had to make those connections, especially because when we moved to this rural area, I didn’t know anyone and my husband was immediately gone.
When I first moved here, I had a three-month-old and a two-year-old. I needed to have that support. And through that support I found a group of women that were open and honest about the hardships of parenting, but in a way that was supportive, not in a way that was bemoaning, if that makes sense. And anyone that follows my Prairie Wife in Heels blog or any of my social media knows that I am very open and honest about the ups and downs of parenting. But I like to think I do it in a way that’s helpful and productive and gives you permission to have those emotions but not to wallow in them.
That’s where that grit and grace idea comes from, because parenting is freaking hard. I have five kids and five different personalities. We also have a exchange student from Spain living us with us for a year, because why not? So I currently have an 18-year-old boy, a 16-year-old boy, a 14-year-old girl, a 12-year-old boy, a nine-year-old boy, and a seven-year-old girl. Any emotion or stage of puberty that you can have.
Julie Gunlock:
You’re in it.
Cathy Holman:
So there’s challenges and there are days, like today, I don’t know how many times I was like, do you have your shoes in your backpack? Have you fed the dogs? You need to get out to the bus, you have to hay the horses. I’m not driving you to school today. I have a podcast. Right?
Julie Gunlock:
Right, right.
Cathy Holman:
But you can do it with a sense of humor and I share in a way that respects my kids. Which again, a whole nother conversation being so public about parenting and the struggles of it while respecting your kids’ boundaries. But I talk about how my teens, they don’t want my help half the time and I’ve had to learn to just keep my mouth shut. My daughter got stood up for a dance 20 minutes before she was supposed to be there, and how do you deal with that as a parent and what’s the right call? How do I teach her to navigate that when she’s 13 years old? And I didn’t think we had to go through that. So when I do share the hard parts of parenting, I always make sure I share a solution. I share the ending to the story, whatever that looks like.
And this isn’t me just preaching it. I actually just left a month ago a career that I loved. For four and a half years, I had a radio show in the big town near me. It was an amazing way to spread that message of living a life of grit and grace throughout my community. And I walked away from it, not because it wasn’t successful, not because it wasn’t bringing me amazing opportunities, but because it was taking away too much from my family. I could not maintain that level.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s funny, I am at a point too where I’m starting to assess the busyness of my life, and actually my career’s going really well just like yours. And it’s funny because one of the things I do is I host a morning drive radio show and the hours, I’m really tired. I have to get up really early and be in the studio. And it’s funny because I love that so much.
So I’m looking at sort of holistically my whole life and my career. It’s funny, this is a podcast through my career so I’m not going to be like, “And I’m going to quit.” And I never would, ’cause I love everything. And I think that’s the hard thing. I love everything I do. I am blessed with just such a fun career and I’m doing things that I love. And I too, I’m in the business of trying to spread messages and help people. I’m not sure help people but at least bring stories and bring people’s experiences.
Cathy Holman:
You are helping people though. We do help people by sharing stories. And that’s the whole philosophy behind what I do at the Prairie Wife brand. Whether it’s as a speaker at events, or when I was doing the radio show, or now through my writing and social media. I always say people are going to leave my space feeling better because either they’re going to say, “Oh my gosh, me too.” Or they’re going to say, “Well I’ve got it together way better than that chick does.” Right?
Julie Gunlock:
Right.
Cathy Holman:
And by sharing our stories that’s what we do. And what I love about what you’re doing with this is you’re just saying, look, this is how one person does. Take what you need and leave what you don’t. Do what’s right for you and your family. And I can tell you, people told me, and this is parenting in a nutshell. They told me and I didn’t believe them, they said, your teenagers are going to need you more and you’re going to be busier with teenagers. And that was me with three kids in diapers. I’m like, “Oh, okay, thanks for that.” It’s true.
Julie Gunlock:
It is true.
Cathy Holman:
And that’s why I left the radio show. I was getting up in the morning and not seeing them before they left for school. My husband still travels. So my oldest son, while he could totally do it, was responsible for getting everyone on the bus. I didn’t like it. I was missing every single volleyball game because of nighttime charity events that were my responsibility as part of the radio station. And my son, my teens, they want to talk at 9:30 at night. Well guess who was already in bed? Or didn’t have the energy to listen and engage when they were ready for me to be present? And everything was go, go, go. I was doing everything. I didn’t drop the ball.
Julie Gunlock:
Was this radio show every day?
Cathy Holman:
Every weekday, yep. Every weekday, 6:00 to 10:00 AM. And then I also had to write five articles a week and create content. And then there was also every Thursday night a charity event, and then you have your remotes, and you have recording your commercials. So it was supposed to be a part-time job, but I spent 40 to 50 hours a week on it depending. And then I was running this brand, prairiewifeinheels.com, creating content daily. I have businesses I have partnerships with.
Oh by the way, I was also emceeing charity events and traveling to do speaking events. So everything was getting done. I confidently say that. My house was clean. My kids were loved. They were fed. We weren’t eating out every night, because when you live 20 minutes out of town you can’t. I was getting everything done but I was losing the joy.
Julie Gunlock:
Yes.
Cathy Holman:
And I wasn’t okay with it.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s so interesting too. I feel like there’s a positive in this story because I think about that and luckily, and by the way, I’m only on the radio two to three times a week. So I have the end of my week and it sounds like your radio job was with the events and there was a lot.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah, and an hour of travel time every day.
Julie Gunlock:
Oh yeah.
Cathy Holman:
That’s something people don’t realize.
Julie Gunlock:
But I feel like the flip side, the positive, and again you loved what you did. But think about it’s almost an embarrassment of riches that we could choose. And this is the other thing about the negativity out there. It’s like goodness, how blessed are we that we have these amazing opportunities and yet are still able to choose, I’m going to scale it back a little bit. I feel like sometimes it’s so funny because you’re older, you’re more confident in yourself. I feel like I kind of know who I am now. I kind of know my style and I know myself really well now and yet I have teenagers who need my time and I feel like professionally, I’ve sort of taken off and I’m doing really well and I’ve really found what I love to do. And I mean, my goodness, I’m 50 so I better have by then. But the thing is that I feel so blessed and I bet you do too, that you were able to step back and that you were able to have those choices and it was your choice.
I want to just turn this over. There’s a cross behind you. You said your son made this paper cross. I love that it’s behind you. What role does faith and your religion and that community have in helping you, helping guide you and helping you maybe make these decisions?
Cathy Holman:
So we are Catholic. I’m a cradle Catholic. My husband was as well, but his family stepped away from the church for quite a long time after his father passed away. And then after we got married and began having kids, both of us renewed that weekly practice of faith and really making it a part of what we do. And I will tell you this is actually not the first time that I gave up a career I loved for my family.
So I worked my booty off to go to college and become a first grade teacher. That was my lifelong dream. I refused, which it wasn’t really a problem because he wasn’t super stoked to get married, to marry my husband until I graduated. Because we started dating when I was 19 and I knew once we got married I would want a family.
So I was a teacher up until my second child was born, which coincided with us moving to this rural area. So I left that career to stay home for 11 years. And that was an adjustment period for me for sure. Especially moving to a more isolated situation. So I had the confidence of past experience of walking away with no regrets a career I loved that allowed me to do that a lot easier with the radio show.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah.
Cathy Holman:
That being said, I bawled like a baby when I announced it on air and I bawled like a baby when I did my last show because I did love it. And Julie, something that amazed me and humbled me was the email messages and the private messages on social media, because I’m still very accessible, from women saying thank you for your honesty. You gave me permission to say I don’t want to do it all anymore either.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah, I don’t want to, it’s funny, it’s like the lean in craze.
Cathy Holman:
And I know I didn’t cover the faith thing. We’ll get back to that I promise. But what you were saying about that, so I think being a child of the eighties, we were told you can have it all. You can do it all. And you can but you can’t do it all well. And something I talk about often at mom groups and faith-based groups that I’m asked to talk at is you can have it all but you can’t have it all right now.
I distinctly remember driving to school one day. I had a screaming newborn baby in the back, and a preschooler and a school-aged kid. And like I said, it’s a half hour, 45 minute drive depending on the weather. And I was driving, dropped the kids off at school and it was just one of those mornings where it took all my control, all my grit and grace to just get going.
And I was driving back and I looked to the side of the road and I saw this woman jogging, just jogging. And I started bawling. I started driving on, I almost had to pull over because in my head I was like, I’m never ever. I was so mad at her and jealous and angry and I felt defeated. Well now, I can go snowshoe and ski for three hours in the mountains but I don’t have a little baby to cuddle.
Julie Gunlock:
I know.
Cathy Holman:
And I can’t smell the hair on my little fresh washed footy pajama toddler anymore. That hurts. There’s a physical pain when I see a picture of a kid in footy pajamas with a fresh diaper.
Julie Gunlock:
It is.
Cathy Holman:
So you can have it all but you can’t have it all right now. And you have to pick and choose. And my faith has always taught me that there’s value in motherhood, and my faith in the Catholic church values motherhood. It values family. And so that gave me strength to pick family even though, like I was just at the post office the other day and with the best of intentions, the sweet guy is like, “Miss you every day on the radio. I wish you hadn’t left.”
And while I know he’s saying it to be sweet because he loved my contribution to the community and that voice. It also was like, “Oh!” Because I know I was doing good. I know I was doing good. But my faith has taught me that my first calling is motherhood. And so again, while there’s ups and downs and that emotional wavering, that is what I’ve chosen and I know it’s the right thing. Our priest came over for dinner the other day and he’s like, “So kids, how is it now that mom’s home more?” And all my kids were like, “It’s great.” Which, who would think you would hear that from a table full of tweens and teens?
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah. They were serious about that. That is really sweet.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah.
Julie Gunlock:
Let’s talk a little bit about, it’s inspiring to hear you talk about you feel called to be a mother. I’m really curious your opinion on how women today, young women. First of all, there’s never any talk of, you can run out of time and that’s a whole nother issue I feel like. And that is something I would like to talk with someone about.
Cathy Holman:
Women are being tricked. Women are being tricked, totally tricked. It’s again that you can have everything. Well you can’t.
Julie Gunlock:
And this idea like, “Oh I’m going to work on my career until I’m 40 and then have a kid. It’s not going to be hard to conceive.”
Cathy Holman:
So I love, love that you brought this up. So I’m going to just plug a different podcast really quick. Elizabeth Day does a podcast, she’s from England and it’s Best Friend Therapy. She did one, I think it came out in July about fertility. It’s phenomenal. And I was just listening to it and bawling like a baby the other day. She’s been unable to have the family she wants. Her friend had a miscarriage and now has two children. So people look at me, you said five kids and people are like, oh my god. I’ve had three miscarriages. My first pregnancy was a miscarriage and I didn’t know if we would ever be able to have children. And that was at the age of 23. There is no guarantee.
Julie Gunlock:
Also Cathy, I’ve had three miscarriages and then I also had some vanishing twins. So I was pregnant with twins and we ended up with one. And so I think about this huge family and really, I feel so lucky because I got pregnant the first time at 32 and I lost that baby. But I feel so lucky to have three kids. But what people often don’t understand, you mentioned I was 23. So when you have a miscarriage, your body needs a long time to recover and then get back. Because your body reacts like it’s a pregnancy so it takes a while for your cycle to come back. And if first time you’re getting pregnant is late thirties and you have a miscarriage that resets the clock. I mean then you got to sprint.
Cathy Holman:
Elizabeth Day was talking about that in the podcast about how she felt like we were tricked because everyone talked about not getting pregnant, not getting pregnant. And with this you can have it all right now. And there’s science that can help you if you do decide to have pregnant. No, no. There’s no guarantee ever that your family is going to look like what you planned when you first got married. There’s no guarantee. And man, my heart breaks, my heart breaks for women that waited too long and now they’re struggling, and my heart breaks for women that do everything right and there’s no known reason why they can’t conceive even with the help of science. It just is so complicated and hard and my heart breaks for women that choose not to have children and are devalued because of it.
Julie Gunlock:
That’s true.
Cathy Holman:
The whole thing is do what’s right for your family, but can we please give women all the information to make the right choice?
Julie Gunlock:
The other thing is we say things, or women are told, “Oh don’t worry. If you want to wait, there’s science to help you.” The success rate on freezing eggs, it’s like under 10%. I mean it is really low. Essentially, it’s not an advanced science here. They’re still kind of playing around with things.
Cathy Holman:
God is still involved.
Julie Gunlock:
God is still involved. And then this idea also of just assuming that someone will fix things for you, that there is some sort of medical. It is such folly and it can result in misery. But it’s not just this sort of fertility thing. Now USA Today and a couple other publications last couple months have been pushing out this thing of don’t get married, single women. There was one in USA Today saying single women make so much more than if they’re married women. Well obviously.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah. But how much goes to daycare?
Julie Gunlock:
And also they were saying single women without children. They were saying don’t get married, don’t have kids because you’ll be wealthy and you’ll be free to go to Greece on a vacation and hang out with your friends.
Cathy Holman:
For some people that’s the right call. But don’t tell me what to do. Don’t tell people what to do.
Julie Gunlock:
But also they never suggest what you brought up right away. There are costs.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah.
Julie Gunlock:
When you’re older, you won’t have a family to potentially take care of you. I mean the gift of children, the hilarity that goes on in my house.
Cathy Holman:
That joyful chaos.
Julie Gunlock:
They say this to women, stay single and don’t have kids, but they never suggest that there might be some cost to that, to your own happiness.
Cathy Holman:
I feel like the more information we can put out there, the better to let people choose the life that they want. Right? I think that that is why I’m so honest about what life is like with five kids. You’re not going to see perfectly matched beautiful pictures. I’m getting ready to post pictures and maybe a little bit of a tantrum about decorating the Christmas tree. And one of the pictures is me pulling my 12-year-old son’s head back and yelling at him because he was being a little punk while decorating the Christmas tree. Overall, is it a beautiful, wonderful memory? Yes. But is every moment perfect? No. And I’m not doing a service to other people that are thinking about a large family if I don’t share the pros and the cons. That is fine if you want to be childless, but let’s give them an authentic look at all the different sides of the story. That’s fine if you want to wait to get married till you’re 35, till you’re 40. But let’s give them all the fertility information so they can make that decision in an educated way.
Julie Gunlock:
Yes, absolutely.
Cathy Holman:
That’s all I’m asking. Just put it all out there.
Julie Gunlock:
This is a perfect segue and honestly I have a billion questions for you.
Cathy Holman:
So part two is coming up. Right? I’m just kidding.
Julie Gunlock:
No, we’re going to talk after this because this is such a great conversation. Maybe we could make this a regular thing.
Cathy Holman:
Yes.
Julie Gunlock:
There’s so much I want to touch on and we can’t do it in this short amount of time. But you do touch on an important point of this sort of… Look, I think there’s plenty of bloggers and parenting social media influencers that you can follow, like yourself, that really show it real. Right?
Cathy Holman:
Yeah.
Julie Gunlock:
They’re not going to give you the filters. And I’m laughing because, first of all, my kids have gotten to the point where they don’t really want to decorate the tree, which breaks my heart and I force them. And then last year there was a picture I took in front of the tree and seven seconds before I hit that I yelled, “Act like you’re having fun, pretend.” And I got this great picture. How have those influencers who do give this shiny, rosy look, you kind of touched on it. What effect does that have on parents?
Cathy Holman:
I think you’re doing a disservice. And I would say the same not just to the big family influencers that are showing it’s all cake, roses and sunshine. I would say that to the homesteading influencers that talk about how amazing it is, and how easy it is to can and do all the things. Which I mean it’s wonderful, but also anyone that has spent five hours canning knows that it is not joy and roses and sunshine. Do you feel pride when you look at your row of beautiful choke cherry jelly? Yes. But your fingers are also stained red for three days and the kids end up eating all of it in two weeks and you could kill them.
I mean just transparency. Transparency and authenticity. I have beautiful pictures I have taken with professional photographers where I look stunning if I do say so myself and then right next to it, you’re going to see a video where I have a messy bun. You can tell I’m on day 10 of dry shampoo and I’m wearing the same hoodie you saw me wearing two days ago because that’s what you do.
Julie Gunlock:
With a stain on it.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah. Because that’s life too. And that is that grit and grace aspect. You can have it all, but you can’t have it all right now. I look good today, but that’s because I didn’t pay attention to my kids at all before they went to school.
Julie Gunlock:
Everyone has a lunch.
Cathy Holman:
I never do anyway. I’m sorry. They can eat school lunch. That is not my jam. No lunch boxes around here.
Julie Gunlock:
Wait. What does that woman say? “Let’s make lunch for our kids,” in that deeply weird voice.
Cathy Holman:
Yes.
Julie Gunlock:
I will admit I’m a little like that.
Cathy Holman:
You do that. You do that. That takes nothing away from me.
Julie Gunlock:
Do what you have to do.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah.
Julie Gunlock:
And that is a theme. And honestly, Cathy, I think after this I’m going to email you because I think you should come on regularly.
Cathy Holman:
I would love to. The more I can do to help spread this idea of grit and grace. And like, girl, you don’t have to have it together every second over and over. What I want people to realize is if you’re not feeling good at the end of the day, I call it the 75/25. This is work. This is relationships. This is parenting. If 75% of the time you’re happy, it’s a win, because 25% of the time stuff is just going to suck.
Julie Gunlock:
And that’s normal.
Cathy Holman:
But if you are only 50/50, you need to pause. You need to step back and look at the big picture and you need to start making some changes.
Julie Gunlock:
And can I add one more number to that? If you are 100% of the time happy, there’s also something a little crazy going on.
Cathy Holman:
Oh, yeah. Then maybe you need to get a little lower on those meds.
Julie Gunlock:
Millionaires with servants. Okay? They’re not happy 100% of the time.
Cathy Holman:
And it’s okay. It’s okay to not be happy. You’re not supposed to. Suffering is part of life.
Julie Gunlock:
Suffering. Suffering. I was just about to say that.
Cathy Holman:
That faith part.
Julie Gunlock:
It’s a part of the journey. Okay, so let’s see. What I wanted to talk to you about, some of the parenting culture. This is why we’re going to have a number two. I want everyone to know we’re going to have a number two, a number two podcast. That sounded bad.
Cathy Holman:
Well, I mean hopefully you have a number two today too.
Julie Gunlock:
My mind is obviously in a teen boy mode that I thought number two was bad to say and I giggled.
Cathy Holman:
And I was right there with you.
Julie Gunlock:
Totally got it. But on our next podcast, I really would like to get your perspective on screen time and how I think culturally different Wyoming is, and many of these sort of Western states are different from these urban megalopolis areas.
Cathy Holman:
Yeah, the rural lifestyle.
Julie Gunlock:
And taking care of yourself and learning simple things. I think kids in certain regions of the country are better off simply because of where they live and the culture surrounding parenting in those areas. So I’d love to get your perspective on this. I’d love to talk more about your faith and how it’s guided your journey. I’d love to talk about what happened in Wyoming during the Covid shutdown.
Cathy Holman:
Or what didn’t happen.
Julie Gunlock:
That’s exactly right. And then what we’ve seen behaviorally, emotionally, psychologically, and educationally with kids.
Cathy Holman:
Absolutely.
Julie Gunlock:
You are working on that issue with your five kids. So we have a lot to talk about in our next podcast.
Cathy Holman:
We do.
Julie Gunlock:
We will schedule that soon. Listen, Cathy, it is so great to finally see you face-to-face, to have you on. You are just a ray of sunshine. I’m so thrilled that we’re connected and that we’re working on this together.
Cathy Holman:
Thank you so much for your time and I’m looking forward to the next time we get to chat.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah. And I think we might have to actually physically get together. We’ll work on that too. You know I want to live in Wyoming, so I think I’ll have to come out.
Cathy Holman:
I can give you a tour. The whole family. You guys can ride the horses. All the things. Your kids can wake up at 5:30 in the morning to feed.
Julie Gunlock:
Okay. Well when they’re riding the horses, I do think we should drink a little wine.
Cathy Holman:
I mean, I’m okay with that.
Julie Gunlock:
Yeah. Okay. Just a couple.
Cathy Holman:
Done.
Julie Gunlock:
All right. Great to see you, Cathy. And thanks again. Oh, real quickly, tell people where they can find you.
Cathy Holman:
So prairiewifeinheels.com is the site, and then I’m across all of social media. You can either Google Prairie Wife and find me, or on Twitter and Instagram, it’s @PrairieHeels.
Julie Gunlock:
Follow Cathy. Thanks again, Cathy.
