Second Chance Queen

Kristianna Mrjenovich (00:00)
Welcome back to episode three of the Second Chance Queen podcast. I'm your host, Kristianna Mrjenovich. And today we are going to have a super exciting guest that I cannot wait to see. I got to see her back in January at our national pageant that we competed at together. And I am super excited to see her this evening. Her name is Mrs. Tanya Holloway.

please join me in welcoming Tanya Holloway, a proud veteran wife, mother, and social and environmental justice advocate. Tanya was crowned Miss Plus America Elite in 2021, secured the first runner up position in the Miss division of Miss Plus World in 2022, and has held multiple pageant titles, including Mrs. Alabama USA Earth 2022 and Mrs. Florida USA Earth 2023.

where she placed in the top 10 and most recently, Mrs. Florida United States 2024. Beyond her impressive pageant career, Tanya is the driving force behind the Humankind Project, an initiative dedicated to fostering kindness towards ourselves, understanding one another and nurturing our planet. In today's podcast, Tanya will share her experiences and insights on second chances, resilience and self -confidence. Please join me in welcoming Tanya Holloway.

Tanya Holloway (01:23)
Hi, my name is Tanya Holloway. I am Mrs. Florida United States 2024, and I am competing for the title of Mrs. United States in October in Memphis, Tennessee. I'm so excited about that. And I'm so happy to be here with you because I know that we competed together with the Mrs. USA Earth pageant. And so it's nice catching

Kristianna Mrjenovich (01:46)
I'm

Tanya Holloway (01:47)
But for those who don't know me, I am a mom of four in my blended family. I have a fur baby who you might have just heard bark, I hope not. have a wonderful husband who is also a veteran and very supportive of me and my efforts. So I'm just very happy to be here and happy to get started on our conversation.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (02:10)
Alright, I'm super excited to have you. Isn't it the best having a supportive husband? We have to give the husbands a shout out. Pageant husbands are like, amazing.

Tanya Holloway (02:20)
Yes, I agree. mean, I don't think, especially as a missus competing, if your husband's not supportive, I think it's just gonna be so, first of all, it be kind of sad. And second of all, it's, you know, it's needed. You need that support, you know? That's marriage is teamwork. So of course, whether they want to or not, they're gonna probably end up being supportive.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (02:46)
It made me so happy to see all of the husbands that were at our pageant because we competed in the first and only Mrs. Only division pageant, which was super exciting and it was catered towards Mrs. And seeing all of the couples was really cool. Sometimes you don't see that at pageants, so I feel like that was really special.

Tanya Holloway (03:08)
It was, and it's one of the things that made Pageant Week fun because I had him with me and he was able to not only just come and watch the pageant, but he was also able to take part in some of the activities that we had going on. So it ended up being really fun. So I'm forever grateful that he is my number one fan.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (03:23)
Yep.

that's awesome. I have mine that's a number one fan too and I wouldn't trade it for the world. well, speaking of our number one fans, I would love to hear of your second chance story. So obviously I've been super open about mine and overcoming domestic abuse and that whole situation. So having a supportive husband obviously is a huge thing to me. I want to know a little bit about your second chance. What is your second chance story?

Tanya Holloway (04:01)
chance that stands out the most is my second chance at love. My husband and I were both married before. This is my second marriage and you know, it's finding love after a devastating divorce. When my first marriage ended, I was heartbroken. I was skeptical. You know, am I gonna find love again? I'm a romantic, so I was not gonna give up on finding love, but I didn't

I had a lot of people say like, you know, are you sure you want to like go through that again? I'm like, what am I gonna do be single for the rest of my life? I just For me, I've always even as a little kid. I always was like when I grow up I'm going to be married like I always wanted a family and and that did not mean being a single mom I was a single mom at one point. That's not fun. Zero stars do not recommend

Kristianna Mrjenovich (04:53)
No, same!

Tanya Holloway (04:55)
Sometimes if it you know it is what it is but yeah I prefer to be married because I just love the partnership of marriage But yeah, it was not a good first marriage for me. Unfortunately, you know

he was not a nice person and so meeting my new my now husband and he's kind and he's patient and he's understanding you know it's so refreshing in contrast to the emotional and physical pain that I was used to with my first husband so that's my second chance

Kristianna Mrjenovich (05:32)
We have very similar second chances. feel like my first and my second husband, I'll be honest, I'm on my third. Third time's the charm for

Tanya Holloway (05:37)
Yeah.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (05:44)
Third one sticks. But I can definitely relate to finding love in that second chance

you know, love and I feel like some of us are just born lovers. We want to love somebody, we want to be loved. But a lot of people don't talk about what it's like being in a healthy relationship after being in such a negative one. Is there anything specific that you'd say stands out to you the most as far as, you know, you had this terrible experience, now you're in this whole new

shock for you? What was the biggest like, my gosh, this is different.

Tanya Holloway (06:23)
Yeah, so one of the things I will say about that is I don't think people talk enough about

the normal struggles that healthy couples go through. You you sometimes see couples and you think, they're perfect. They probably never argue. They're probably, you know, doing the deed every night and they're probably, you know, all that stuff. it's like, people don't talk enough about, you know, what you might think or what you might perceive as perfect. You don't know what's going on behind closed doors. People have a good way of hiding and only showing you what they want you to see. And it's kind of like social

Kristianna Mrjenovich (06:54)
Mm -hmm.

Tanya Holloway (07:02)
You know, I it looks great back here, but on the other side of the camera It's a hot mess Like that and so I wish more open and honest about what marriage is really like when people say marriage is work It's true marriage is work. It requires two people who are mature enough to Discuss when things get you know when there's disagreements to be able to maturely have a conversation about

Kristianna Mrjenovich (07:02)
Yes.

Yeah.

Tanya Holloway (07:30)
what the issue is and how to come to a

that's what it takes. And I don't think enough people let that be known. That was one of the things I struggled with when I went through my divorce was,

I will be honest, I'm just gonna put it out there. So I've never really talked about this, but one of the reasons I married him was to save face. Everyone told me not to marry him. Everyone was like, girl, are you sure? And I was like, I love him. And they were like, yeah, but are you sure? And we had done all the stuff and we got everything ready and paid all the money and I didn't want to back out.

because we had been engaged and broken up before and Then we were back on again and now the wedding was back on again. I didn't want to like you know Be off again again, so I was like no, it's fine even though two nights before we got married he put his hands on me and Looking back I wish then I should say you know what?

Kristianna Mrjenovich (08:34)
no.

Tanya Holloway (08:41)
If Tonya today was there then, no question. But at the time, I was much younger. was, you know, didn't have self -confidence and all that kind of stuff. And so I stayed and I went through with the marriage.

So red flags present themselves and your gut is not lying. If you feel in your gut that this person's not right or something's wrong, you're most likely you're on to something.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (09:13)
That is so accurate. We have a lot of parallels in our story with my second husband. We were together four years before we got married and we had broken up after we got engaged and gotten back together as well. So by that point, when you finally get to the wedding day, you're like, I'm this far in, I've got to commit to the bit. And sometimes, like as we can look back, hindsight's definitely 20 -20. Cause you're like, well, I know.

girl don't run away. But when you're in that, you've got all the friends and family gathered and the time's there and you're just like, okay, well, we're gonna make the best of this. So I get that, you know, if we knew what we knew now, how different things would be.

Tanya Holloway (09:57)
Yes, if I, you know, I have sons, but if I had a daughter.

all the things I could teach her and tell her because I was always, you know, my parents joked about the fact that when I was little, I cried about everything. So they needed to toughen me up. And then they said, then we created a monster because then you were too tough. And I remember I was going on a date with this guy and he showed up, he was late and he was always late. And so I had enough. And so he showed up and I said, you're late. And I slammed the door in his face and I went back to my room. And my mom was like, did you just?

Go tell him your story and stuff and I'm like, he was late. I mean, that's disrespectful. So I wish I'd kept that confidence, but what happened was after I had my first child, crazy me, I

No one's ever gonna wanna marry me now. No one's ever gonna, I've gained weight. I wish I was that size now. I've gained weight. I have a child. I'm just gonna have to take what I can get. And that's the mindset that led me to accept some of the behavior that I accepted from my ex -husband. Because if I'd never gone into that mental space and still was, you know, shut the door to space, Tanya, we would have never got

Kristianna Mrjenovich (11:11)
definitely 100 % agree with a lot of the things that you're saying, especially talking about normal relationships and healthy relationships, especially after toxic ones. You know what to expect from a toxic one and a bad one.

but you go into an "regular" one and you think, this is perfect, especially like the honeymoon phase, right? Cause everything's perfect. You're not arguing. You're like, this is a whole new world. You're like Alice in Wonderland. And then you hit that first conflict as like a healthy couple and you're like, whoa, whoa. And I know I was kind of like, we went, I mean, we've been together three years and I can count on one hand our arguments because we really are like two peas in a pod, but we do have conflict without arguments. And when we hit that first conflict, it's

is this as perfect as I thought it was? Because there's conflict. And then you have to kind of realize, like, conflict's not a bad thing necessarily. Everybody has conflict.

Tanya Holloway (12:03)
Right, everybody does have conflict. We just think that they don't because it looks so perfect. So they probably never argue. Of course, knowing what I know now, I know that that's not true. But at the time, that's what I thought. I think it was we were a couple years in before we had our first argument because I was like you like, is this for real? Because we don't argue. I love a good debate like I am a debate.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (12:25)
Mm -hmm.

Tanya Holloway (12:31)
Love I love a healthy like this not disagreement so to speak but I love to talk to someone who has an opposing view My parents are we're always like you should be a lawyer should have been a lawyer I'm like I don't know school for that long though, but if to talk to people about why do you think that way? Well, what about this? And so I love that I can debate with him without it turning into an argument

and the fact that he's smart. So I can talk to him about political things and, you know, what's in the news. But the funniest thing, our first argument was about whether or not we would get a dog after the dog died. Seems so silly now, but our first argument was he had a dog before we...

Kristianna Mrjenovich (13:10)
Wow!

Tanya Holloway (13:22)
Inherit it was my step dog. So he had a dog I'd never I didn't grow up with pets except for my goldfish who my sister's fish murdered We'll talk about that on another day. I got revenge But I didn't grow up with pets so It was new to me and I was just kind of like yeah Well, you know his dog was a little bit older and maybe the way I said this was insensitive looking back on it But I was just kind of like well

Kristianna Mrjenovich (13:24)
Yeah

Tanya Holloway (13:51)
You know, she was she was older so was like we probably won't get another dog when she passes and he was just like He totally went against what he said initially which was okay. Yeah, we won't and then all of a sudden it was like yeah I want another dog and I was like wait you didn't say that when we dating It's like we're married now. try to trick me in to get a dog It was the silliest thing

Kristianna Mrjenovich (14:18)
I heard the bark. I heard the bark, so somebody won.

Tanya Holloway (14:24)
First of all, I don't even know why I'm arguing about that because even though that was my step dog, I loved that dog. She tolerated me, but I think when we had to put her down, couldn't be, I sobbed. was like, I had to leave the room. And so then it was just weird not having a dog. So yeah, we did have a discussion though before we got the new dog.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (14:28)
you

No.

ho ho!

Tanya Holloway (14:53)
who was supposed to be my dog and here we are.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (14:57)
Isn't that funny how that works though? Because we always, I had a, my husband inherited a step dog. Cause I had a dog when we met, he was older, same thing, only it was my dog. And when he passed away, it was devastating. People don't talk about losing that dog was worse than losing most of my friends or family members. It was terrible. It was so bad that the next day, I impulse adopted.

the dog that we have now. We have a golden retriever now that was supposed to be, first he was going to be my dog, then I'm like I'm not ready for a dog but I need a dog so you have the dog. So he was going to be my husband's dog and then we found out both when our daughter was born that it's the daughter's dog. That's Nora's dog, don't even look at him when she's around you don't exist. So it's funny how that works.

Tanya Holloway (15:51)
Yep.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (15:53)
But you can't, sometimes you just can't go without a

Tanya Holloway (15:56)
No, but it is super heartbreaking because they don't live as long as us. And so the heartbreak of losing the dog, that is my daughter. So if anything happens to her, I will be in bereavement. I will not be OK. So, yeah, it's hard. again, he's like, I call him Dr. Doolittle, my husband, my husband, because animals love him.

He, you know, he'll call me from work at lunchtime and I'll hear birds chirping and I'm like, are they like sitting on your shoulder like Snow White? Because that's just like in my mind, the animals just like, la la la la la, like they land on his shoulder. Meanwhile, I'm here.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (16:43)
feel like that's a second chance husband trait though, because my husband's the same way. So I feel like they come into your life and then they come in like snow white and all the animals love them. And that's how you know they're good guys.

Tanya Holloway (16:55)
our first road trip he stood watch because there were birds out there and i'm scared of birds and i was eating my lunch and he was like watching and yeah because he was gonna shoo him away and i was like this guy's a keeper i'm keeping him because he will let me be my crazy bird phobia self and won't make fun of me

Kristianna Mrjenovich (17:03)
Yeah, I learned

That bird phobia is a real thing for you too. We got to meet in person and did our cleanup for those of you that don't know. We did a community cleanup with Mrs. California Earth at the time and we learned that Tanya is very afraid of birds and we were respectfully trying not to laugh but they were gunning for

Tanya Holloway (17:43)
They

Kristianna Mrjenovich (17:44)
Okay, so I want to touch on something that we mentioned kind of. You mentioned confidence. That word is like my pet project right now. I just launched a workshop. It's called Confidence Crown Workshops and it focuses on building confidence in girls and women because I have a theory.

And maybe you can chime in on this. I have a theory that the abuse statistics, which for those that don't know, over 50 % of women in their lifetime at some point will be abused. And I have this theory that if we raise confidence numbers in women and raise confidence in women and girls, that that rate will significantly drop. Because every survivor that I've talked to that's been in a really bad relationship or tolerated something that they shouldn't have.

did not have high confidence. So now I'm out here trying to make boss babes from four -year -olds up because that's my theory. in regards to confidence, if you could speak to girls or women today and send them a confidence tip or a positive message about confidence, what would you say?

Tanya Holloway (18:58)
I would say that confidence is 100 % believing in yourself, your abilities, and your worth. And when you realize that your opinion is the only one that matters, you won't worry about what other people think. It's going back to what we were talking about earlier

You will not tolerate certain things when you know your worth and you know that right is right, wrong is wrong. I'm not gonna stand for this because I don't have to. I will tell you, never ever say to yourself, well, no one's gonna want me because, because that's what abusers say.

Don't say it to yourself because it's not true. I'm here to tell you, it's not true. It is so not true. You might feel that way or think that way, but you you can have your moments. Everybody can have their feelings, but then get out of that. Get out of that place because it's not true.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (19:56)
That is a good one. And I feel like that is absolutely an abuser's go -to line. I still have a text message from my ex -husband that said, do you really think that anybody is gonna love you the way that you are? They're just gonna take what they want from you and abandon you over and over again. Nobody's gonna want you. I feel like that's their line. That's how they get you. And you think, okay, nobody's gonna want me. Nobody's gonna want my kids. Nobody's gonna

you know, the baggage that I am now because of this situation. I used to always say, I'm broken, I'm broken. And my husband would say, you're not broken, you've got little bruises, and bruises heal, and then you're gonna be just like new, even better. So I feel like that is a very common thing with abusers. They want you to feel like you're

Tanya Holloway (20:37)
Yeah.

They do, they want you to feel like they're the only one that can fill the void, whatever that void is, whether it's not wanting to be alone or not wanting to raise a child on your own or whatever the case may be, they find those insecurities and they exploit them and make you think, even if you don't say it back, if they say it enough,

It gets into your head and you start thinking maybe no one will want me, maybe no one will, dah, dah, dah, dah. It's not true. Don't let them do that to you.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (21:18)
agree 100 % and for confidence. I feel like everybody has one thing that they're kind of know weary of when maybe not so confident about. I know for me it's been my weight since I've had kids. I was a very skinny little girl in high school. I was tiny. I was a dancer and then as I've had kids the scale just gets a little bit higher.

And I've struggled a lot with that, especially going into the pageantry world because I grew up watching Miss USA and all of these thin women as a plus size woman now. And I'm sure you can relate to this too. We are curvy queens. How do you feel about being in this industry that

you know, we're kind of pushing the envelope a little bit. I'd say we're breaking ground there and pushing for inclusivity and I think that's amazing. So do you have any tips for girls or women that are curvier like us that may think that they can't do something because they're curvy? What would you say to

Tanya Holloway (22:30)
Well,

you a little bit about my pageant journey and where I'm at now with that.

So I started out, did not do pageants when I was younger and I've never been skinny. I've always been thick and fabulous. So when I was smaller, I think in high school I was maybe around the size eight, eight, 10. And then as puberty hit and I started filling out even more, maybe like 14 -ish. So I was never small, but I was very athletic and involved in

dance and color guard and that kind of stuff. But as you have children and your hormones do what they do to your body after having children, it is hard to maintain a fabulous physique especially if you also have life stuff going on. You also have

you know, parenthood, maybe single parenthood. So that was my story. never, I could not get into pageants. When I was able to do pageantry, I was already married. So it had to be a Mrs. thing. I felt safer doing Mrs. pageantry because I thought they'll understand I'm curvy, but I've had children. I'm not a spring, well, I'm a spring chicken, but I'm not 20. You know, I

I'm 46. Like, I am not young. So I, to me, I thought that that would alleviate some of the misconceptions about body image and pageantry. Unfortunately, I found that not to be the case. I did compete in my first pageant. It was Miss Plus America. And I did that because I felt safe in a plus pageant. So I was like, everyone is plus size. So I don't have to worry about, oh, she's this, she's that.

They're still biased there. There are people who would be like she's not plus size my girl What are you not looking at the same? yes But then there's also

Kristianna Mrjenovich (24:35)
Mm -hmm.

Tanya Holloway (24:40)
the other side of it. if you can't compete in a plus size pageant because you're too small, so to speak, without getting some kind of backlash, but then if you go to a straight size pageant, now you're too large. So really what I would like to see is the pageant world being more inclusive of all body types. And there are women competing that are all body types. Unfortunately, the big pageants, Miss Universe, Miss USA, Miss America, even I'm not seeing

Kristianna Mrjenovich (24:59)
Yes.

Tanya Holloway (25:10)
I'm not seeing diverse body types crowned. I'm seeing them compete as in we'll take your money But I'm not seeing crowns on heads of women who look like me and until that happens Well, I don't want to say I'm gonna keep competing because I think this is my last year but not because of that Just because it's time but I will say I want girls to keep competing keep competing. Don't let them keep that

if they don't see you, they can't crown you. You just have to keep showing

Kristianna Mrjenovich (25:45)
relate and that's I was so proud to see how well you did at Mrs. USA Earth you were top 10 and so that was amazing seeing curvy your body top 10 I was hoping that you would wind up in the top five with the crown on your head I was hoping I was gonna be up there too we were gonna represent but that didn't pan out but I agree

Tanya Holloway (25:52)
So thank you.

Girl, see, I'm sure. So was I.

Yes. Yes.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (26:14)
I think all systems need to be more inclusive. And I think we're definitely working in the right direction. But it is very discouraging when you fall in the gray area, like you and I do. I'm a size 14, 16. I'm the mid -size. Not really plus size, not really. But in the pageant world, I'm definitely plus size.

in that like gray awkward area. And then it's hard finding a place that you really belong. And I feel, I think it's great that we have plus size pageantry, but at the same thing you experienced that there was still a discord there, there was still, you know, a disconnect.

Tanya Holloway (26:59)
There's still that bias.

going to say like, you know, and plus patents are there and I'm glad that they're there, because obviously, you know, as being Miss Plus America 2021, that was my first pageant and and that I will always be grateful for that opportunity. But I wanted to compete.

in a non -niche pageant. I didn't want to be Miss Plus Anything, Miss Black Anything, Miss Whatever. I wanted to just be Miss or Mrs. Whatever. Like, Mrs. USA, Mrs. Whatever. But you have to find the right system that is going to truly embrace diversity.

I think I've found that in the system that I'm competing in now. We'll see. But I mean, I do because I wouldn't I would not

Kristianna Mrjenovich (27:47)
Hehehe

Tanya Holloway (27:50)
compete in a system if I didn't feel that there was an opportunity for diversity, not just with race, but also body types. I saw that with Mrs. USA Earth when I watched their competition before I competed. And I was like, wow, look at, I mean, it wasn't just size. was also, there was a woman in a wheelchair. It was, I was like, this is it. This is where I'm going, you know? So I just want to see more of that.

but more crowns for deserving women. Because if the only reason you don't crown me is because I'm not a size six or four, then that's your loss, unfortunately. Because I have a lot to offer as a title holder. I'll be a great representative. And if you're looking at my size as a reason not to crown me, then that's unfortunate. And that's on you. And my dog is.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (28:42)
I relate 100%. That is why I also chose the system that I'm in with International Ms. It's obviously different from your system, but the same thing. I watched the type of title holders that they had. I'm gonna be interviewing, I think next week, Whitley, who was at our pageant volunteering. She was backstage and she was fantastic. And when I watched International Ms, she was an outgoing queen.

And I saw her and I went, my gosh, she's tattooed like I am and she's not covering them. She's got a beautiful body. And I thought, okay, they crowned her, so I've got a shot. And I think we need to definitely see more pageants that are willing to do that, that are willing to put crowns on the heads of women.

that are beautiful that are at different stages in life. If you're going to break the age barrier, the way some of the organizations have moved to, they've now said you can compete if you're married, you can compete at any age. Why can't we break that barrier if you can compete if you're Kirby? expecting a 70 year old woman to compete that is a size zero, it's just not exactly fair.

I think we need to, you know, we're headed in the right direction, but I would love to see, just like you said, more diversity and inclusive sizing and putting the crowns on the heads of those women because we want to move away from the shallow house society, I think. I think it's time.

Tanya Holloway (30:22)
Yeah, it's way, way overdue. And I'm still, the jury's still out on like the Miss, Miss USA organization as an example, you know, raising the age limit and that kind of thing. When they crown a woman who's married over a certain age, then I'll be convinced that that was a genuine push for inclusion. and not a, we'll take your money, but you're not going to win. I just, I hope, yeah, I hope that that's not what the case is,

Kristianna Mrjenovich (30:46)
Yeah, publicity ploy.

Tanya Holloway (30:52)
Unfortunately, until I see it, I won't know that that's genuine.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (30:56)
love to see almost a more defined way of judging, because something I've learned with pageantry is it's also so subjective. And I can say that being a judge, you I'm sure you've judged pageants, I've judged pageants, and when you're sitting there in that chair, it's very subjective. It's what you're looking for at that point in time. And I'd love to see some sort of centralized

not rubric, but form of judging come out so that there's even playing fields for everybody, everywhere. I think that'd be great.

Tanya Holloway (31:33)
Yeah, I think transparency in judging. I think someone had mentioned one time about the Miss USA scores maybe being televised when the contestants are walking, kind of like they do with the Olympics. You see their scores. That would be really cool. It could go.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (31:51)
That would

Tanya Holloway (31:53)
Either way, think like, you know, because if I'm a judge and I'm watching someone and I think, you know, she doesn't look very confident right now. And I'm, and someone else is like, I love her dress and my gosh. So our scores might be very different, but if you drop the highest and the lowest scores and or something like that, I think you're onto something. If there was some kind of formula to keep people from really.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (31:55)
I'm

Mm -hmm.

Tanya Holloway (32:20)
know, skewing the numbers with their judging. I think that it could be helpful, but I would love to see scores to know what the judges gave them because I think that's, it should be available to the people watching. Yeah.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (32:35)
and free scores. Free scores, not buying scores.

That's been a trend in some systems, buying scores. No.

Tanya Holloway (32:48)
Yeah, and that's sad too. I know some systems don't even offer the scores, but hopefully most systems will get on board with offering, not only offering, but also offering them at no charge.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (33:03)
Yeah, that would be a great standard industry practice.

Tanya Holloway (33:08)
Yes, I agree.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (33:09)
I wanna do something a little bit fun.

done this with anybody yet because you're my first official guest but this is going to be a new tradition that I'm doing and I want to know if I had to give my second chance queen crown away to a celebrity or a famous person not this one because I love this one but if I gave my title of second chance queen up who would you designate the honorary second chance queen I want to I want to create a Hall of Fame of honorary second chance queens

Tanya Holloway (33:41)
Gosh, this is a hard question.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (33:44)
That's a fun...

Tanya Holloway (33:47)
Gosh, I don't know, but for now I'm thinking Celine Dion, only because I've seen her on TV lately. And I think she's got quite a story. She's been through a lot and she is trying to make her comeback. And I think that it would probably be like her third or fourth chance, but I think she's got quite the comeback story. So I think Celine Dion would be someone I think would have a shot at the crowd.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (33:53)
Ooh!

I love that Celine Dion's amazing. I just watched a video about her being so kind to a fan during an interaction and it made my heart so happy to see a kind celebrity. I

think my honorary choice would be Taylor Swift because I'm kind of in my Swiftie era right now.

I've never been a huge Taylor Swift fan. I didn't not like her I just was not one of those girls that's followed her from the very beginning but her latest album the tortured poets

is Been my obsessive Album that I'm playing on repeat right now and a lot of it is relating to I feel like she's in an era very similar to us She's gotten out of a bad relationship or a long relationship that didn't

She got some tortured music out there and now she's in her so high school era where she's like in love and she's got Travis Kelce and it's fantastic. So I think I would make Taylor Swift an honorary second chance queen too. Hi, Taylor.

Tanya Holloway (35:21)
That's valid, that's

Kristianna Mrjenovich (35:23)
If you became famous tomorrow and you had a published quote, like this was going to be the quote that was attached to your

what would you like it to

Tanya Holloway (35:35)
if God brought you to it, he can bring you through it. That is one of the ones that I live by because I really think that, you know, you're never alone, truly, when you have God. And so you can always make your test your testimony. And I think that that's what I'm doing in my daily life. In everything that I do when I do have an opportunity to speak about stuff that I've been through. It

along those lines of, you know, I went through this, but I came out on the other side better for it. Didn't think at the time that it was gonna work out, but it's going to be fine. And so that's what I try to live

Kristianna Mrjenovich (36:18)
Love that, that is a fantastic quote.

know you're competing for Mrs. United States, you're Mrs. Florida United States. Tell us when your pageant is so we can watch and root for you and cheer for Florida.

Tanya Holloway (36:33)
So our pageant is October 5th through the 9th. It's in Memphis, Tennessee.

And it will be available to live stream. So just follow the United States national pageants on Instagram and Facebook and you can stay up to date with all the the pageant competition happenings to see what's happening there. I'm so excited. I'm nervous because it's a new system, but I'm it's a good nervous like I don't I don't know what why I'm like this, but I don't really get nervous like about

Kristianna Mrjenovich (36:44)
Yay!

Tanya Holloway (37:10)
doing interview or being on stage, that to me comes kind of naturally. It's more the stress of the prep, so to speak. The finding the gown, the rehearsing and all the things, making sure that you pack everything and the travel, that's what I get nervous

Kristianna Mrjenovich (37:32)
pageantry is such a huge universe, but it's also so small.

Tanya Holloway (37:36)
It is, it is. And once you compete with people, get to know them and you like them, you connect and you still follow them, even if they're, whether they're competing or not. But I have so many people. love to just share them on, watch what they're doing. Like last weekend, who was it that competed last weekend?

Kristianna Mrjenovich (37:45)
Yeah.

Tanya Holloway (37:52)
our friends from, from Mrs. USA Earth, had Tara, she was North Carolina the year that I, the first year I competed. And then Lindsay, who was fire, they both did the, USOA pageant last weekend and I was glued. I was like, I, yes, I spent the money. I watched the lives. And as you mentioned, it's subjective because I knew I had a winner. And when my winner didn't win, I was like, that's, I'm closing the laptop. I don't want to watch no more.

I'm so mad. So you never know what you didn't see behind closed doors.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (38:24)
you

I I loved, I root for Lindsay all the time. Whenever I see her anywhere, I'm like, Lindsay, you're awesome. And then I did that with Halle Pouncey, who was Indiana when we competed. I rented that livestream and my husband and myself and the baby screamed at that TV through the intros and we were like, there she is. He has probably videos of me acting a fool over Haley. Haley, we love you.

Tanya Holloway (38:36)
Yeah.

Yes.

someone I know is competing trust I'm following I'm looking I'm the results if nothing else if I'm not watching it live I'm at least keeping up on social media so I could be like I'm I'm everybody's cheerleader if you're a nice person and you're a good human I'm going to cheer for you

Kristianna Mrjenovich (39:04)
Yes.

Yeah.

Sisterhood is definitely, it's huge in pageantry. I feel like pageantry gets a bad rap for cattiness and like, you know, people have their misconceptions about it. But the sisterhood that I've built with just my very first pageant this year has been crazy. I'm like rooting for all these women that I spent a couple hours with in person, but we see each other on social media for so long and it's funny, because you were competitors at one point.

and you're competing for the same title, but you're still also rooting for this girl. And then it's kind of like a relief when you're not competing anymore, because now you're rooting for her for everything. And it's like, okay, I cannot root against myself now.

Tanya Holloway (39:57)
Yes, now you can

Yes, and that's sad because even though there's only one crown, and that's why I've always said you've got to get something out of pageantry besides the the crown, or it just won't be for you because everyone except the winner is going to be disappointed. So make it a good experience for yourself and try to get as much as you can out of it. Enjoy it. And if you win, that's even better. And if you don't, at least you got something out of the experience.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (40:17)
Yeah.

before I let you go, you mentioned it when we were talking and you mentioned it briefly in the beginning of this conversation how you think this is your last pageant.

Is there a chance we can still see Tanya again in the future? Is this a hard close? Are you like sure about that? Or could we see a second chance queen revival with Tanya coming back in the future?

Tanya Holloway (40:56)
Thank you.

will never say never. Just like I really thought, and I feel silly now, that I was going to return to USA Earth after competing. I thought if I do compete again, it's gonna be there. And then I did some soul searching and decided, you know what, I'm gonna give another system a try. So I'll never say never. But I have things that I'm looking forward to. We have our third grandchild that's turning one in September.

We have, know, my youngest son is 18. He just graduated from high school. You know, my mom, my dad passed away earlier this year and my mom is now a widow. so it's just family stuff is really what I'll be spending more time on going forward. Being a title holder is, it's a job, you know, one that I love. I enjoy and that's why.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (41:53)
It is.

Tanya Holloway (41:57)
But I think it's just, you know, I want to take this last pageant and if I win, I hope I win so I can go out with a bang. And like I have some really great ideas for my year. Whether I win or not, I'm doing stuff for the next year under either this title or Mrs. United States. And then after that, I will most likely be done. But the doors got this much of a crack in it.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (42:25)
because I feel like going out as A national title holder makes it a little bit easier definitely

Tanya Holloway (42:30)
Yes, yes, puts a nice little period on the end of the sentence. Like I did this and it was great and it was beautiful and I'm done now. Like I feel like that's what I've been kind of waiting on. Like I want to get to a certain level or do something and then I can be satisfied and be done. But

Kristianna Mrjenovich (42:50)
I'll be rooting for you. I've got my fingers crossed. I'll be rooting for you. I'll be cheering at the screens for you.

Tanya Holloway (42:52)
you

Thank you and I'll be doing the same.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (43:01)
I I told my husband, I said, international Ms. is my system. I'm gonna walk away with a crown. I don't know if it'll be this year. I don't know if it'll be next year. If it takes five years, I'm sorry darling, but this is the system that I just resonate so much on a personal level. It's all about empowering women and that's what I'm out here doing all the time. So I'm like, this is the one for me. So hopefully both of us can.

secure those crowns this fall and then we can reign and then we can you know put the feather in our caps and say okay it's time to focus on something else.

Tanya Holloway (43:38)
Yes, and move on to other initiatives. I will always be doing something. I will always be active in my community and advocating for those who don't have a platform, so to speak, to amplify their message. Whether I have a crown as my platform or whether it's another organization or my own organization, I'm going

always be working towards that. So we'll see. We'll just see what happens.

Kristianna Mrjenovich (44:10)
relate but I will definitely be rooting for you and so will all of our listeners. Make sure you go and follow

Thank you everybody for listening to myself and Tanya chat this evening and make sure you follow her on socials to keep up with Mrs. Florida United States 2024. Tanya Holloway.