Woman of the Year finalist: Farmer Steph Schmidt on post-natal depression

This psychologist, farmer and young mum tells of the shocking reality of post-natal depression – and how she’s now helping other women, especially those living on the land.

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Steph Schmidt was living on a remote farming property and utterly exhausted. She was a new young mum and she started having intrusive thoughts.

“There was just this fleeting thought of ‘What if he slips under the water?’, just a feeling of ‘I would get some rest’,” she recalls.

The farmer and psychologist has been open about her experience with post-natal depression and dealing with intrusive thoughts – describing that moment as the scariest of her life.

And she’s been working tirelessly to help other women, especially isolated rural women, feel not so alone ever since.

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Today clinical psychologist and farmer Stephanie Schmidt is a busy, happy, and loving mum but she battled frightening post natal depression.

Mrs Schmidt packed up her “city girl” life and moved to Worlds End in South Australia’s northeast to join her farmer husband, Simon nearly eighteen years ago.

After welcoming their third baby boy together in 2020, Mrs Schmidt, who has a honours and Masters degree in Psychology from Flinders University, left her role at a not-for-profit organisation in Clare to start her own venture.

Her new mission was to create a psychological service specifically focused on bettering the mental health of her fellow members of the farming community.

“I just saw that we needed to kind of attack it from a different angle, and take more of a proactive, preventive approach, rather than just waiting until the crisis hit,” Mrs Schmidt said.

“(I found) myself in this unique position …(where) I am living the reality of farming life as well as having the knowledge as a psychologist.”

The 37-year-old now runs workshops and produces social media content providing mental health information to farmers.

She also runs a podcast, while juggling her three sons, aged ten, seven and four, and working on the young family’s sheep and cropping farm.

The former Prospect resident said “one of (her) biggest lessons” has been learning to make all the elements of her life work around each other.

While her services are available for all different kinds of people involved in the farming industry, Mrs Schmidt said a lot of her clients are also mothers wearing various hats while on the farm.

“I probably find myself often working more with the women in farming, just because it is a bit more of a niche area,” Mrs Schmidt said.

“I think, the struggles that women in farming face has often been quite invisible.

“The focus often falls onto men, but women experience just as many of the same pressures and (are) juggling a huge kind of physical and mental load very often on the farm.”

When she is not making the mental health of farmers across the state better, you will find Mrs Schmidt out on the farm working on the land with her family.

“I love being active and busy on the farm as well, getting my hands dirty, being involved with the sheep work or with our cropping program,” Mrs Schmidt said.

“I guess I’ve found that I enjoy the farm work just as much as the psychology and other parts of my life.”

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In August last year, the clinical psychologist spoke out about her experience with post-natal depression and dealing with intrusive thoughts.

“If I, as a clinical psychologist, can experience mental health issues and experience postnatal depression, it shows, none of us are immune to it,” the rural mental health advocate told The Advertiser.

“I sometimes think I was the perfect parent before I had kids. I had really strong expectations of ‘gentle parenting’, ‘attachment parenting’ and all the things that were really important to me in how I wanted to be as a mum.

The clinical psychologist and farmer is a loving mum to Ted, Angus and Darcy.

She loves being a farm wife and helping other women – especially those living remote.

“For me, that added to my feeling of failing. You get stuck in this cycle of thinking ‘Well, everyone else can do it’.”

Mrs Schmidt has been named a finalist in the Inspiration of the Year category in the 2025 Advertiser/Sunday Mail SkyCity Woman of the Year Awards and said the honour came as a “surprise”, especially during a year where South Australian farmers have faced the worst drought in decades.

“I think over the past 12 months, the drought in South Australia has been incredibly severe, and probably that’s where some of the inspirational side … of sharing stories and strategies and some of my own experiences on socials, … I know that has struck a chord with people,” Mrs Schmidt said.

Despite receiving the honour, Mrs Schmidt admitted that she does not always feel like she is able to practice what she preaches as everyday stresses interfere with her intentions.

“Impostor syndrome is not the right word for it … it is really tough at times for myself and our family on the farm and so I’m glad I’m an inspiration for other people, but I’m not always doing the best job at walking the walk.

“A lot of what I’ve believed in and wanted to do over the last year especially, is just normalising with a drought, that it’s okay if you’re struggling, or it’s okay if things are really hard, that’s an understandable experience.

“Being a human is hard, and there are struggles sometimes.”

Mrs Schmidt is one of 41 female finalists nominated across nine categories in The Advertiser/Sunday Mail SkyCity Woman of the Year awards.

An awards ceremony to reveal the winners will be held at SkyCity Casino on Thursday, March 6.