00:00:00
Speaker 1: How many times can I say I'm sorry?
00:00:04
Speaker 2: How many times?
00:00:06
Speaker 3: You can run and you can hide.
00:00:11
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the muster.
00:00:12
Speaker 3: Catherine Wright joins us next. She is a rural health advocate, mental health advocate, and joins us in the Southland Rural Support Trust spot for this afternoon, looking at the mindset in wake of the weather that we've experienced over the past couple of months, which is very much a rinse and repeat of the spring of last year. And Catherine's going to look at this with a bit of a different tact today and all about what it means for being the partner of somebody who's out there doing the SOG every day and just looking after yourself.
00:00:42
Speaker 1: Catherine, good afternoon. Good to catch up again. Hi, Andy.
00:00:45
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me again.
00:00:48
Speaker 3: And straight off the bat as well, I mean, when your partner's out there or your husband, your wife, they're out there, even the kids, and they're in this weather.
00:00:56
Speaker 1: Day in, day out.
00:00:58
Speaker 3: It doesn't just take a toll on the people out there, but you're inside or you're there for the other half effectively and trying to decipher what their day's been like.
00:01:07
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, it can be a grind.
00:01:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. And I think we have to acknowledge first up that so many rural women are doing the same job.
00:01:17
Speaker 1: Absolutely, yeah.
00:01:19
Speaker 2: They're also doing that. But yeah, there are quite a few, I guess, that still hold that more either traditional role in the home or they might be working off-site, off-farm, whatever it is. I think it's really important, and this is something that we all need to remember, is that you don't have to have all the answers. You don't need to solve the problems yourself. But just having some empathy and just saying, oh, that sounds like a complete shit show. Am I allowed to say that?
00:01:46
Speaker 1: Well, you just did.
00:01:48
Speaker 2: But rather than saying, well, have you thought about this? Or what if you do that? Or do you think that it's time to leave the position or whatever? That you would just have a bit of empathy and meet them where they are, really.
00:02:00
Speaker 3: I've had some good mates, and they've been a sounding platform for a lot of other people who go there and talk about what their issues are. But after a while, they said, look, I never really gave.
00:02:11
Speaker 1: Time for myself. It was always about listening to other people.
00:02:15
Speaker 3: So how do you try and get a happy medium when you're the sounding platform for a lot of individuals?
00:02:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's a real double-edged sword because actually being a sounding board or helping others, we know from research as well that it really does better our own mental health. So the old saying is that if you can't do anything to improve your own day, you can at least improve somebody else's day. And that does have a slow-on effect. I think we're really hard on ourselves, particularly rural people, that we think that we have to have it all figured out. We have to be the person who does it all and is capable, especially from people looking from the outside in. But we're just human. And if we, I guess, can have, I talked about a bit of empathy before for your partner, have a bit of compassion and empathy for yourself. You know, you're doing your best. You're doing what is often a really taxing physically and mentally job. So what would you say to a friend in that situation? Would you tell them to bugger off and drink a cup of concrete? Or would you say, you know, that sounds really hard. What can I do to to help? What can I change here? What's in your control, essentially?
00:03:27
Speaker 3: Once upon a time, the concrete would have been the answer, though. So it's something we talk about a lot, Catherine, these days. If you're coming forward with a problem, then chances are people will listen because it's a different era.
00:03:39
Speaker 1: That's one good thing. Yeah, yeah.
00:03:42
Speaker 2: And people are often surprised that when they do change tech and when they do eventually open up or just show that vulnerability which is a bit scary for some people the reception is way better than they ever thought and they wonder why they didn't do it before and I'm guessing that everybody listening would be no different here.
00:04:03
Speaker 3: Now you're doing a PhD around mental health effects on young people in the agricultural industry how can you relate this to what we're talking about at the moment?
00:04:12
Speaker 2: So you're thinking of my Master's, Andy.
00:04:15
Speaker 1: Master's, sorry, yes.
00:04:16
Speaker 2: My PhD is on rural mental health and community connection and land use change. And actually one of the biggest findings that I had come up that I strangely didn't foresee was actually the hidden labour that's involved in running a community. Often this is by women, so it's often unrecognised, it's unpaid work. We talk a lot about community resilience, and resilience is such an overused word, but rural communities, oh, we're so resilient, we do this, we do that, we go through the wind event, we do go through the weather, but we're only resilient because of our informal infrastructure, so our volunteer base. We cannot be resilient without having a dedicated pool of people that come back over and over again, sometimes in multiple ways. They hold... Multiple roles, they run school fundraisers, they organise events, they care for family members, they drop meals off at the door. Yes, there are all of the recognised volunteer roles, but there's so much that gets under-recognised. And it is often by women.
00:05:26
Speaker 1: Is resilience a word we need to remove from our vocabulary?
00:05:31
Speaker 2: I think it's got a bad rap. I think that the general sort of belief of the word is that it's a bouncing back. But I prefer to use the word recalibrate. So when something happens to us, we take our learning of what happened and we apply it to new situations. Yes, we do need to do some of that to be able to take life's hits because life is not easy. Life can be really tough for some people. but it is definitely not going back to normal and carrying on. It's taking what you know into the future for future situations.
00:06:07
Speaker 3: And just finally, I think it's a great time to appreciate as well, Catherine, that to make time for yourself to go out and do things.
00:06:13
Speaker 1: We're always talking about farmers getting off farm.
00:06:16
Speaker 3: It can be easier said than done, but no matter who you are, you've got to take that opportunity to break away and take a bit of time out.
00:06:22
Speaker 2: Yep, just choose your times of year, choose your time of week. It doesn't have to be at a certain time Just do it when you can do it.
00:06:30
Speaker 1: One of those things you've just got to make time for. Good on you, Catherine. Always good to catch up.
00:06:34
Speaker 2: Thanks, Andy.
00:06:37
Speaker 3: Catherine Wright, Rural Riders is getting underway tomorrow night as well. Go to the Rural Support Trust and find out what's happening there on the socials. 0800 787 254 for a confidential quote.
00:06:50
Speaker 1: Catch up would be the better terminology. Max McCallum's up next.
Speaker 1: How many times can I say I'm sorry?
00:00:04
Speaker 2: How many times?
00:00:06
Speaker 3: You can run and you can hide.
00:00:11
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the muster.
00:00:12
Speaker 3: Catherine Wright joins us next. She is a rural health advocate, mental health advocate, and joins us in the Southland Rural Support Trust spot for this afternoon, looking at the mindset in wake of the weather that we've experienced over the past couple of months, which is very much a rinse and repeat of the spring of last year. And Catherine's going to look at this with a bit of a different tact today and all about what it means for being the partner of somebody who's out there doing the SOG every day and just looking after yourself.
00:00:42
Speaker 1: Catherine, good afternoon. Good to catch up again. Hi, Andy.
00:00:45
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me again.
00:00:48
Speaker 3: And straight off the bat as well, I mean, when your partner's out there or your husband, your wife, they're out there, even the kids, and they're in this weather.
00:00:56
Speaker 1: Day in, day out.
00:00:58
Speaker 3: It doesn't just take a toll on the people out there, but you're inside or you're there for the other half effectively and trying to decipher what their day's been like.
00:01:07
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, it can be a grind.
00:01:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. And I think we have to acknowledge first up that so many rural women are doing the same job.
00:01:17
Speaker 1: Absolutely, yeah.
00:01:19
Speaker 2: They're also doing that. But yeah, there are quite a few, I guess, that still hold that more either traditional role in the home or they might be working off-site, off-farm, whatever it is. I think it's really important, and this is something that we all need to remember, is that you don't have to have all the answers. You don't need to solve the problems yourself. But just having some empathy and just saying, oh, that sounds like a complete shit show. Am I allowed to say that?
00:01:46
Speaker 1: Well, you just did.
00:01:48
Speaker 2: But rather than saying, well, have you thought about this? Or what if you do that? Or do you think that it's time to leave the position or whatever? That you would just have a bit of empathy and meet them where they are, really.
00:02:00
Speaker 3: I've had some good mates, and they've been a sounding platform for a lot of other people who go there and talk about what their issues are. But after a while, they said, look, I never really gave.
00:02:11
Speaker 1: Time for myself. It was always about listening to other people.
00:02:15
Speaker 3: So how do you try and get a happy medium when you're the sounding platform for a lot of individuals?
00:02:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's a real double-edged sword because actually being a sounding board or helping others, we know from research as well that it really does better our own mental health. So the old saying is that if you can't do anything to improve your own day, you can at least improve somebody else's day. And that does have a slow-on effect. I think we're really hard on ourselves, particularly rural people, that we think that we have to have it all figured out. We have to be the person who does it all and is capable, especially from people looking from the outside in. But we're just human. And if we, I guess, can have, I talked about a bit of empathy before for your partner, have a bit of compassion and empathy for yourself. You know, you're doing your best. You're doing what is often a really taxing physically and mentally job. So what would you say to a friend in that situation? Would you tell them to bugger off and drink a cup of concrete? Or would you say, you know, that sounds really hard. What can I do to to help? What can I change here? What's in your control, essentially?
00:03:27
Speaker 3: Once upon a time, the concrete would have been the answer, though. So it's something we talk about a lot, Catherine, these days. If you're coming forward with a problem, then chances are people will listen because it's a different era.
00:03:39
Speaker 1: That's one good thing. Yeah, yeah.
00:03:42
Speaker 2: And people are often surprised that when they do change tech and when they do eventually open up or just show that vulnerability which is a bit scary for some people the reception is way better than they ever thought and they wonder why they didn't do it before and I'm guessing that everybody listening would be no different here.
00:04:03
Speaker 3: Now you're doing a PhD around mental health effects on young people in the agricultural industry how can you relate this to what we're talking about at the moment?
00:04:12
Speaker 2: So you're thinking of my Master's, Andy.
00:04:15
Speaker 1: Master's, sorry, yes.
00:04:16
Speaker 2: My PhD is on rural mental health and community connection and land use change. And actually one of the biggest findings that I had come up that I strangely didn't foresee was actually the hidden labour that's involved in running a community. Often this is by women, so it's often unrecognised, it's unpaid work. We talk a lot about community resilience, and resilience is such an overused word, but rural communities, oh, we're so resilient, we do this, we do that, we go through the wind event, we do go through the weather, but we're only resilient because of our informal infrastructure, so our volunteer base. We cannot be resilient without having a dedicated pool of people that come back over and over again, sometimes in multiple ways. They hold... Multiple roles, they run school fundraisers, they organise events, they care for family members, they drop meals off at the door. Yes, there are all of the recognised volunteer roles, but there's so much that gets under-recognised. And it is often by women.
00:05:26
Speaker 1: Is resilience a word we need to remove from our vocabulary?
00:05:31
Speaker 2: I think it's got a bad rap. I think that the general sort of belief of the word is that it's a bouncing back. But I prefer to use the word recalibrate. So when something happens to us, we take our learning of what happened and we apply it to new situations. Yes, we do need to do some of that to be able to take life's hits because life is not easy. Life can be really tough for some people. but it is definitely not going back to normal and carrying on. It's taking what you know into the future for future situations.
00:06:07
Speaker 3: And just finally, I think it's a great time to appreciate as well, Catherine, that to make time for yourself to go out and do things.
00:06:13
Speaker 1: We're always talking about farmers getting off farm.
00:06:16
Speaker 3: It can be easier said than done, but no matter who you are, you've got to take that opportunity to break away and take a bit of time out.
00:06:22
Speaker 2: Yep, just choose your times of year, choose your time of week. It doesn't have to be at a certain time Just do it when you can do it.
00:06:30
Speaker 1: One of those things you've just got to make time for. Good on you, Catherine. Always good to catch up.
00:06:34
Speaker 2: Thanks, Andy.
00:06:37
Speaker 3: Catherine Wright, Rural Riders is getting underway tomorrow night as well. Go to the Rural Support Trust and find out what's happening there on the socials. 0800 787 254 for a confidential quote.
00:06:50
Speaker 1: Catch up would be the better terminology. Max McCallum's up next.
