What happens when a woman who’s spent years being told she’s “too much” stops apologizing for taking up space?
In this episode of Tend HER Wild, Betsy and Kate sit down with Amanda Goodman, an Emmy Award–winning journalist, advocate for women and children, and co-creator of Faith & Four Letter Words. We start with Amanda’s first ten years in Pennsylvania, where she was a curious, outspoken middle child who always wanted to know why. The questions that got her labeled a troublemaker in Catholic school eventually became the foundation of her nearly two decades in television news.
Amanda takes us inside the pressure to be likable on air and shares the moment after covering the 2016 election when a boss’s humiliating comment about her appearance changed what she was willing to accept. She talks about the fear and grief of leaving the job she’d wanted since childhood, how deeply it shook her to be told she’d never be relevant again, and how she built a new home for her journalism. Today, she uses her own platform to lay out the facts, ask hard questions, and draw attention to stories that affect children and families.
Along the way, we get some classic Amanda one-liners and an invitation to update our own “hell no” lists. We talk about what girls learn from the conversations they overhear, how women can show up for one another when it counts, and what it means to outgrow a relationship with gratitude for what it gave you. In one of the most tender moments of the episode, Amanda shares how it felt to be the strong one in her family and how that experience shapes the mother she is today. She wants her kids’ first thought when something goes wrong to be, “I have to call my mom.”
In this episode, we talk about:
- How a childhood habit of asking “why?” became one of Amanda’s greatest strengths as a journalist
- What it cost her to meet the expectations placed on women in television news, from how she looked to how agreeable she was expected to be
- The leap from the anchor desk to independent journalism and advocacy for children and families
- What the conversation around the Cornell 7 case brought up about consent, victim-blaming, and accountability
- Why Amanda keeps a “hell no” list and gives herself permission to revise it as she grows
- What we teach our daughters about inclusion and competition through our everyday choices
- Why the women we think of as strong still need someone to check in and ask how they’re doing
- The childhood scar Amanda sees as her doorway into the Wild Woman, and how she’s healing it through the way she shows up for her kids
“When you make it through the fire as a woman, you take a bucket of water back for the next woman.”
Find Amanda on Facebook at That Amanda Goodman.
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Today’s episode supported by:
Kate Moreland Transformational Coaching:
http://www.katemorelandcoaching.com
Heartland Yoga:
http://www.heartlandyoga.com
Dr Yoga Momma:
www.dryogamomma.com
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