Pat McDermott was born in Ottawa, Canada and graduated from Carleton University. She worked as a newspaper and magazine journalist in Canada, London and Sydney. Pat was Assistant Editor and Senior Writer of the first Cleo Magazine, before becoming a Feature Writer and Columnist for The Australian Women’s Weekly – a position she’s now held for 30 years. Pat’s husband, Dennis, is known to AWW readers as the MOTH – the Man of the House. They have three daughters, Reagan, Flynn and Courtenay and two sons, Patrick and Rowen aka ‘Ruff Red’. For 15 years, in tandem with writing ‘Family Matters’, Pat was Corporate Communications Manager at Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney.