There is always one thing that can easily choke someone up.
For Sylvia McLain that is her family.
"Our most accomplished thing that we've done in our whole lives is blend our families," McLain said. "That's a soft spot."
McLain started her career in the mid seventies as a nurse. She never took the easy way out and soon moved into the Oil and Gas Industry as a safety coordinator.
"In those days, you didn't go out in the field as a woman," McLain explained. "It became a new career path with a lot of people because you had to go out and inspect the rigs, inspect the living quarters, and we were a straight land operation so there was no offshore stuff. It was interesting and difficult to always have a good line in the sand as to what you were there for, what your work was, and to do your job was get in and get out."
Through the years McLain changed career paths, and made sure that those changes included her children.
"Because of the agricultural related jobs that I had, which was a very family related venue," McLain explained. "It's people with their children and family. I was very fortunate that I was, once Cody and Jim were born in the early 90s and into the early 2000s, I was able to include them in all of the things that I did."
In 2005 McLain took another big step and did something others cautioned against. She and Bryan McLain joined their two families and started a business together.
All in the same year.
"Our children all work together, they spend time together, we have gatherings together," McLain said. "That's my most accomplished feat is that we blended such a large family with so many dynamics in it."
Over 15 years later, that step has proved to be the right one.
Click below for unedited interview with Sylvia McLain. Also catch a funny moment with her dog, Scrappy.
If there is one piece of advice McLain can give to other women out there it is, "Sometimes you have to leave your doors open," McLain said. "You have to take opportunity when it knocks and open the door or you must might miss it."
Never shying away from challenges life may throw her way, Sylvia McLain proved that if you put your mind to it, anything is possible.