Hello my pen name is Sonya Monty
My Story
Born second of four sisters at Ashgrove Brisbane, in a small private hospital which as with John’s experience, no longer exists as a hospital. In fact, family stories have led me to believe that my youngest sister was the last birth in the maternity section before it closed its doors to any further patients.
My primary years were spent living in North Brisbane during school terms and on my grandfather's farms during holidays usually. My father's love of the water did lead us to vacation "overseas" on occasion and memories of his forays into water skiing, and the era’s obligatory sunburn and sand coated car trips are warm memories. “Overseas” of course meant a day trip to Bribie Island for us simple folk. I was the kid who was either leaning against the car door, blissfully reading, daydreaming, or singing at the top of my lungs to the songs that we had on our cassette recorder, much to the angst of my older sister who hated my vocal tones. Life with three sisters was for the most part (squabbles aside) lots of fun and adventure packed, particularly on our holidays, and when other families would join us at the farm.
Teenage years were for me turbulent, as changes in our living circumstances due to my parent's separation, meant we moved to Maleny full time. Maleny is beautiful country town set in the hinterlands of the Sunshine Coast which for me was a dream location as my heart is drawn to quieter locales (as much as I enjoyed city and coastal life also). Taking on a new school, new friends, and new routines taught me resilience and flexibility as I negotiated finding my place as a teenager. Thankfully the years of horse-riding, motor-bikes, creek swimming, visits to Kings and other coastal beaches, and art and crafty pastimes, helped to ground me while we lived through the tragic loss of my maternal Grandpa to MND when I was sixteen, and then the sudden loss of my paternal Grandma when I was seventeen. Life has a way of balancing the sad with the happy and even though the years were turbulent I maintain that they were pretty awesome times for a young person. My sisters feel that I'm a bit teflon-coated when it comes to holding onto bad memories. I'm personally glad that I'm like that.
Moving back to the big smoke of Brisbane to do tertiary training I began a career as a high school educator and as a first time teacher was posted to the small cane farming community of Babinda for a few years. Fond memories of exploring the northern parts of our beautiful state are still very dear to me, particularly the river, lakes, and cave adventures. I was thankfully able to indulge my passion of English teaching in my first teaching post, but this was cut short through having to move back south for family health reasons.
Upon returning to the Sunshine Coast there were some more turbulent times for me as I found my way in my faith. Once restored to my true north pole my life became more focussed and I met the love of my life John in 1986, and we married in 1989. It’s been close to forty wonderful years that we have walked alongside each other through the raising of four amazing (now adult) children, and we now have the honour and pleasure of seeing our grandchildren growing up, and this is a daily delight.
My education career took a partial selah over the years that we raised our children, but work wise I was still extended to the max. I retrained in software engineering and joined John in running a business from home, while also being highly active in our faith community.
Once our children were all in school, I again ventured into education and then having to make a change in pathways for personal health reasons I chose to study further both in creative writing and to do my master’s in counselling to become a professional counsellor. I am still working full-time in counselling as a trauma informed therapist, alongside writing both my blogs and my novel in progress “Whisked Away”.