‘My son’s studies inspired me to do a law degree – 14 years later he admitted me into the supreme court’

Someone said to me: Do you really think you can do a law degree? It's hard.' I said: Being a single mother and raising four children by myself is hard'

I never considered leaving my home town, or going to university, when I was growing up. I thought that I would live in Mount Isa all my life, and find a job there in one of the shops. No one I knew at that time lived outside of Mount Isa.

I am Wannyi/Kalkadoon, and I was born prematurely as my mother had cancer. Sadly, she passed six months later. My sister said I was small, but a fighter. I was the youngest of 12 children. Growing up, my father eventually had to go back out to the stations to work as a cook, while my elder sisters and my mother's family helped look after us.