Why Emma Hawkins isn’t your typical WAG
AFL Geelong star Tom Hawkins and his wife Emma open up about their need to stay humble — whether on the field, with their kids or on her self-mocking social media feeds.
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Bogged tractors, ponies to feed and obsessive rainfall measurement techniques — married life for Emma Hawkins looks almost nothing like one would expect for the wife of an AFL player.
But for Hawkins and her beloved Geelong Cats star Tom, the glamour of the Brownlow Medal red carpet is practically an occupational hazard; they’ve long cared more about cows than they do couture.
Both of them were raised in NSW’s Riverina region, where they experienced — and fell in love with — the beauty and brutality of the Australian landscape.
“I have these really fond memories from childhood, of growing up with space and outdoors and horses,” says Emma, whose family was the first to trade Merino wool and sheep in Deniliquin.
But around the time she turned 13, she recalls, “There was a really big drought in our area. Those memories of our parents doing it tough are still etched in our heads.”
Not to mention a staunchly down-to-earth outlook on life. The couple met through school in Melbourne when they were teenagers and shared a first kiss in Year 12 that sealed the deal.
They’ve been together since, and married in March 2016.
“It’s very rare to still be with your high-school sweetheart,” says Emma, who as a teenager starred in Chris Lilley’s We Can Be Heroes and Summer Heights High as main character Ja’mie’s best friend.
“But it’s nice to genuinely just fall in love and have feelings for who you are as people. You’re not falling in love with anything external.”
The couple have made their home on a 62-hectare hobby farm that’s a 20-minute drive from the heart of Geelong, and it’s there — along with those ponies and cows — that they are raising daughters Arabella, two, and Primrose, almost five months.
Tom signed on with the Cats when he was 18 — his father played for them, too; now 31, he considers how he has navigated sports stardom. “My personal view is that I’ve never been above or beyond any of my friends or teammates or even supporters,” he tells Stellar.
“It’s not in my DNA, and it’s certainly not in Emma’s, to ever feel like we are on a pedestal.”
It’s this humility and focus on his family that has endeared the leading goalkicker not just to his wife but the cheering public, as well.
After kicking his first goal of the season, he made a rocking motion with his arm in dedication to Primrose, who had arrived just days before round one.
Similarly, Emma’s openness — and self-effacing sense of humour — about motherhood on her social media accounts have garnered her a fan base to rival her husband’s.
Whether comparing her swollen pregnancy ankles to Jessica Simpson’s or deliberately cutting off Tom’s head in an awards night photo to “recognise the hard work and commitment of our partners”, the 31-year-old aims to tell it like it is, an antidote to the often overly curated online projection of life as a WAG.
“I’ve always been an over-sharer,” she says. “And I just want to connect with like-minded people. Everyone I’m around had tiny little baby bumps and seemed to snap back to their weight. [So] I would follow women who had pregnancies like me.
“I haven’t had anyone like that directly around me, so I’ve just stalked them on Instagram and I hope I can be the same for others.”
Putting herself out there has come at an occasional cost. “When I’m being trolled or someone comments on my weight — if they say that on a day I’m feeling good, it’s water off a duck’s back,” she tells Stellar. “But if they say that on a day when I’ve had no sleep and I’m feeling crap, then it will hit me where it hurts.
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To be honest, there have been times when I’ve attended the Brownlows and Tom has told me, ‘Don’t worry about what people think.’ But comments will make you feel insecure. I’ve learnt to block it out as I’ve gotten older.”
The nasty barbs don’t stop Emma from sharing the adventures of raising kids on a farm with her followers, and the joys of a simpler upbringing also inspired her new business Homegrown, a range of organic baby and children’s clothing with prints inspired by the Australian outback.
“We should be proud of materials like cotton and Merino wool that we produce in our backyard,” says Emma. “I wanted to create a clothing line that was made from Australian organic fibres and pays tribute to Australia.”
And despite all he’s achieved on the field, Tom points out that watching his wife manage motherhood with the daunting launch of a new business is its own kind of motivation. “I’m so proud of her — I probably don’t tell her as much as I should,” he admits.
“As a player, I become so selfish in my everyday living. I have to look after myself so much — what I drink, what time I go to bed... She lets me do that, she allows me to do what I’ve wanted to do since I was a kid and live my dream. It’s probably a little bit clichéd, but she’s the star in this relationship.”
Homegrown is available from August 26 at homegrownkids.com.au.
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Originally published as Why Emma Hawkins isn’t your typical WAG