Carpe Diem Way Of Life For Mayhew
Wildlife Expert’s Passion For Sharing Is Infectious
by Jeffrey Reed, Editor, LondonOntarioSports.com
Anyone who has had the opportunity to speak with Amanda Lynn Mayhew senses that this expert outdoorswoman, despite her daily struggles and demanding schedule, boasts unwavering inner peace. You hear it in her voice and see it in her eyes, whether huddled with her in an ice fishing shack on a frozen lake in Ontario, or while watching one of her highly-popular episodes of, That Hunting Girl, airing on Sportsman Channel Canada.
Fact is, nothing has been handed to Mayhew on a silver platter. The 46-year-old mother of three adult sons grew up in a trailer park in the Northern Ontario community of Manitouwadge, where her parents, father, Alexander, and mother, Irena (who died in 2016), had to hunt and fish in order to feed their family.
“My parents would fish as much as they could to make sure our family (including sister, Miranda) had protein to eat,” Mayhew said. “For my dad, hunting a moose or bear would feed the family for a year.”
By the late-1990s Mayhew was a single mother forced to hunt in order to feed herself and her three sons. In 1998, she was diagnosed with Graves’ disease, an autoimmune disorder that causes hyperthyroidism, or overactive thyroid. With this disease, your immune system attacks the thyroid and causes it to make more thyroid hormone than your body needs. Weight management can be a nightmare, and extreme exhaustion can sap the body of energy.
Fast forward to winter 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic, and Mayhew shares the fact that she also lives with Postherpetic Neuralgia, a complication of suffering with shingles. It affects nerve fibres and skin, causing burning pain that lasts long after the rash and blisters of shingles disappear. She also lives with laryngopharyngeal reflux disease (LPR), and irritable bowel disease (IBS). And recently, Mayhew was diagnosed with PTSD – post-traumatic stress disorder.
Yet most of Mayhew’s followers aren’t aware of her constant challenges. Perhaps that is a testament to her tireless efforts as an athlete, inspirational speaker, angler, powersports enthusiast, sport shooting advocate, hunter and celebrity. The latter will never define Mayhew, though. Her mission statement, “To empower, educate and inspire individuals of all ages to find their place in the outdoors community by providing and sharing knowledge and experience of the outdoors,” clearly defines her self-defined role.
LondonOntarioSports.com is proud to award this year’s Jeffrey Reed Courage Award to Mayhew for her selfless, never-ending – and growing – efforts to inspire others with her talents and her passion for life.
As a disabled person from birth and living with numerous skeletal deformities, I was fortunate enough to have had many mentors assist me with setting and achieving goals throughout my entire life. In 2001, at age 39, I achieved what many said was impossible: I pitched for the London Majors of the semi-professional Intercounty Baseball League. Today, I am a skilled golfer and ambassador for numerous golf industry members.
Success is shallow without sharing, so in 2015 my wife, Beth, and I established the Courage Award, presented by LondonOntarioSports.com. Now in its sixth year, the Courage Award allows others to share their amazing stories with anyone wishing to be inspired by their message of hope and determination.
Ed. Note: Click here to read the official news release, announcing Amanda Lynn Mayhew as the winner of the 2021 Jeffrey Reed Courage Award.
Mayhew’s story would lend itself well to a Hollywood movie – its twists and turns are almost unbelievable, but its narrative is necessary in today’s cynical world: Dream big and never stop dreaming; work with mentors and mentor others; learn from failure; give 100 per cent at all times; and never quit. Those are the five pillars of the Courage Award.
Rural Roots
Now living in Southwestern Ontario community of Southgate with her husband, Craig, Mayhew is nothing but a country girl. “I usually have sheep and chickens and ducks, and in the summertime either turkeys or pigs – or both,” Mayhew said.
As children, Mayhew and her sister, Miranda, learned very early to respect the land, embrace the outdoors and to live with a strong work ethic. Said Mayhew, “Growing up in a very remote town in Northern Ontario, this is just what we did. It was a no-brainer. People were always out gathering and harvesting food, and having fun making memories with their families and their children. It was everything I knew – a part of my life and my raising that made me exactly who I am today. To know the importance of conservation and where your food comes from, and having bonding family moments is what makes life life.”
Later, while raising her three sons, Logan, 29, Brady, 26, and Mackynzie, 22, Mayhew saw all of life’s lessons which her parents passed onto her now being passed onto her own children.
“I raised my children the same way … to spend all of those moments with them in the outdoors, teaching them how to drive, how to harvest their first birds, sitting in tree stands with them and watching them be successful in their hunts. I watched them grow up with each other and learn the importance of conservation and where your food comes from, and how to properly use tools like trucks, off-road machines, firearms and archery,” she explained.
“My three boys, who all have their own families now, all have incredible qualities which I am proud to say have come from how they were raised. They appreciate the world and life around them, they appreciate animals and they appreciate who they’re with – they respect people and how they were raised.”
After her Graves’ disease diagnosis in 1998, Mayhew again faced a new challenge head-on, and turned to fitness to combat the auto-immune disorder. After undergoing radiation treatment, she began to reshape her body while bettering her overall well-being in the gym, and with another of her passions: bodybuilding. In fact, just two years after the diagnosis, she became a personal fitness trainer, and founded her own fitness magazine, Fytness Fanatik.
“My body and health started to change for the better, and others were taking notice, so they began asking me for advice,” explained Mayhew, who has lived with asthma during her entire life. “I was overwhelmed with attempting to assist everyone I could – not just through the gym, but also through words of advice. So I founded and created an advertisement-free magazine and community with Fytness Fanatik. I wanted to bring to focus all ailments, mental and physical, in order to create a community where no one was left out or left to be alone. I wanted to inspire them and push them through their struggles.”
Tireless Worker
Today, Mayhew’s all-encompassing brand, Just Hunt, Inc., is one of the most recognizable outdoors brands in Canada. She launched her own marketing firm more than 30 years ago, and handles all of her own on- and off-line media efforts and client engagements, including everything from graphic design to event management.
Of course, Mayhew is best known for her current TV show, That Hunting Girl, airing on Sportsman Channel Canada. Previously, her show, Just Hunt, was a big hit on Wild TV. She’s the official ambassador and host of the Great Outdoors Stage for the Toronto Sportsmen’s Show, and through Just Hunt Inc. operates, Trailblazing the Outdoors, which now incorporates the Women’s Hunting Association.
Trailblazing the Outdoors, inclusive to all individuals who want to become an outdoorsperson, sees Mayhew offer education “for an adventure of a lifetime.” She hosts Canada-wide programs including her own Range Days, hunting clinics, hunting and fishing (open water and ice) adventures, as well as off-roading.
About eight years ago, Mayhew was working at a gun shop where women recognized there was a female working behind the counter selling firearms. “They were a little intimidated by asking guys questions,” she said, “so they came in and they felt comfortable talking to me.”
Those simple conversations led to her creating Range Days to teach women how to shoot a gun. It wasn’t long after that when women asked her who they could hunt with, and thus was born Mayhew’s, Take Me Hunting program, which allows her to guide women who are fully licensed to hunt but who are in need of mentors.
Accolades are nothing new to Mayhew. A proud member of the Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights, she was named recipient of the Code of Arms, Golden Bullet Award for Hunting Ambassador of the Year in 2019. Her efforts in charitable work raising awareness for ailments in the Kitchener-Waterloo area have seen her nominated multiple times for Woman of the Year in the Health and Wellness category, and she has claimed numerous Citizen of the Week awards in the K-W community. Mayhew has also supported groups including Heart & Stroke, Ronald McDonald House Charities, The Hospital for Sick Children, Canadian Lung Association and Progeria Research Foundation. As well, her dedication to fitness has seen her draw praise from Chuck Norris, who inspired the Total Gym bodyweight training line.
As for receiving the 2021 Jeffrey Reed Courage Award, Mayhew said she is “incredibly honoured to be receiving such an important award. It means so much to me because of the ailments I struggle with and have overcome. I decided long ago to be brave and focus on what I can do, rather than focus on my limitations. As I started sharing my accomplishments and the lessons learned from failures, I was greatly inspired by individuals, just like Jeffrey Reed, in order to teach and encourage others.
Added Mayhew, “I am grateful for the recognition of my hard work, and I will never quit working on my dream to bring hope, knowledge and positive experiences to every person who is chasing dreams of their own!”
Despite her fame and success, Mayhew remains true to those values instilled in her by her parents. In fact, one senses that this small-town girl from Manitouwadge still awakens each day and pinches herself to make sure her dreams have come true. And this year’s Courage Award winner considers empowering others as her biggest mission in life.
“I wasn’t always so at ease with life. I’ve had some very troubled times and have been in financial situations which I couldn’t control. I’ve had medical complications – still live with those,” Mayhew said.
“So being able to overcome those things and knowing that I have something to give to others, and just taking time to talk with people, including answering questions for kids, is overwhelming. I’m very honoured.”
Mayhew said she continues to set new goals and strive to achieve them “by living one day at a time, by inspiring others. It has allowed me to be motivated to keep inspiring others. To see the difference I can make in someone’s life, taking them on an adventure, teaching them about the outdoors, training with them in fitness and talking with them about nutrition is my way of life and makes me happy. It’s who I am.”
Without a doubt, Mayhew will continue to inspire all of us who believe in the power of hope, dreaming big and working hard to see those dreams come true.
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For more than 40 years, award-winning print and broadcast journalist Jeffrey Reed has written about sports and leisure in Southwestern Ontario. Reach him at jeff@londonontariosports.com.
