The Hits radio host PJ Harding is awaiting the arrival of baby number two. Photo / Kellie Blizard
As she awaits the arrival of baby number two, The Hits radio star opens up about marriage, motherhood and making peace with the madness of the media world.
There are two J-words that Polly “PJ” Harding doesn’t like to use – “juggle” and “journey” – but it’s just not possible to discuss her year without using both of them.
Back in March, she and her long-term boyfriend Brendan “BJ” Campbell tied the knot in a beautiful ceremony under the redwoods at Mount Bruce in Wairarapa. She also started a new job presenting the popular The Hits Drive show, alongside co-host Matty McLean, and launched a podcast on the side.
And earlier this month, she and BJ announced their 2-year-old son Charlie was going to be a big brother as they were expecting a second child. So there’s been a lot of juggle in this journey.
The rose-tinted glasses of pregnancy have returned, laughs PJ, 34, chatting to Woman’s Day from the porch of her home in Wairarapa.
“With motherhood, you’re going through the most intense emotions of everything, and it comes with the good and the bad, and you do start to forget the hard parts as time goes on,” she smiles.
“I think that’s why mothers who have 20-year-olds look back on it so fondly – because there is so much beauty at the heart of that time, but it’s hard to remember that at the time.”
When it comes to the birth, and then the reality of having a newborn and a typically rambunctious toddler, PJ says she is trying to lean into an attitude of surrender.
“I’m excited about the newborn bubble because this time around, I know how temporary it is. Last time, I felt like I was going to be sleep-deprived forever. The dynamics of your relationship shift and everything is flipped upside down. But now I want to embrace the chaos and the magic.”
Both PJ and BJ – yes, that was his nickname even before they met – knew they wanted to have more children, and when it came to working out the best timing, the radio star was aware of her career path and wanting to give herself a bit more time in between babies.
“But then we started rolling the dice and … the dice was rolled!” she laughs. “There’s so much pressure to find a perfect balance, but there isn’t one. Sometimes you’re going to be more motherhood-focused and other times you’re going to be more career-focused.”
PJ told her The Hits co-host Matty soon into the pregnancy – “I think about a week after I found out” – because she didn’t want to shock him with the news.
“He’s an incredibly supportive friend and colleague,” she says, even helping cover for her when they had to do a work trip that involved wine-tasting early on in her first trimester.
“I told everyone I was doing ‘Sober till October’ and they were like, ‘Wow! We haven’t really heard of that!’ Matty stood by me and helped me because I’m such a bad liar.”
Before she started back on the airwaves with Matty in January, she had taken a three-year step back from full-time radio presenting.
“I still compare myself to other people in the industry and think, ‘What if?’ You can have that dialogue in your head where you’re like, ‘Would I have been more successful if I had made this decision instead?’ But I think that’s a really toxic mindset to get into.”
When PJ stepped away from her high-profile presenting job in Australia in 2021, she had to face a whole round of headlines about her career being over. But it wasn’t – it just shifted gears and allowed her to build up her personal life alongside her professional one.
“I had accepted the fact a long time ago that I didn’t want work to be my everything and that has given me a sense of peace.” It helps, she says, to keep that attitude in an industry like the media, where things can change on a dime.
“I know people who make this their whole identity and end up miserable in some way because if work becomes your whole identity, if it gets taken away from you, it’s like, ‘Who am I?’ So I’ve tried my best to build up other pillars in my life as well.”
Her relationship with BJ, a farmer, started in 2017, with tricky timing on two fronts – the pair met just as PJ had moved to Melbourne for work and then the pandemic came along, meaning the long-distance lovebirds were unable to travel to see each other. Being newly married and nestled with her family in rural New Zealand has also added to PJ’s sense of peace.
She and BJ, 33, had been planning their big day on and off for years, she admits, after becoming engaged in 2020. She credits their wedding planner Paula Bevege for helping them pull it all together.
“Every relationship usually has one planner and one person that’s along for the ride,” she laughs. “We didn’t really have that, so we would have been lost without her.”
Their toddler Charlie played a big part on the day.
“He was there for the ceremony and even though he had a few meltdowns along the way, it was so special to have him there,” she says.
This year has been so busy that the memory of tying the knot already feels “like a lifetime ago”, but it enforces PJ’s mindset of just embracing every moment of celebration when it comes along.
“Having kids just reiterates how temporary everything is,” she muses. “Everything does go by so quickly, so it really does hammer home the importance of enjoying everything when you can.”
It’s the value of those daily rituals to keep your head above water that has inspired PJ’s new podcast Slow It Down. “It’s so ironic because I’ve never felt busier,” she grins.
But in the podcast, she’s keen to impress the importance of routine and ritual to ground a busy life.
“It’s coming from a place of surrender that life isn’t going to slow down any time soon, but I don’t want my life to constantly feel busy,” she says.
“I wanted to find a way to come back, ground myself and smell the roses along the way because I don’t want to get to 80 going, ‘I just felt like I was too busy the whole time’.
“It’s about trying to hone in on the parts of our day that we might see as mundane and really appreciating the magic in them. That’s what I’ve learnt is key for getting through these hectic years.”