But when it came to sacrificing a couple of months with her kids to be part of the new NRL women's rugby league competition, her youngest son Malaki needed a verbal contract before his mum could sign a written one.

"My youngest had some questions he wanted to ask the coach [Daniel Lacey]," Dragons recruit Schwalger laughed. "My son asked, 'is mummy going to be safe? Where’s she staying? Are you going to look after her?' It was really cool."

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There are dozens of personal reasons why prospective semi-professional rugby league players either side of the Tasman might be hesitant to dip their toe into the water for the NRL's inaugural foray into a women's competition, featuring the Dragons, Roosters, Broncos and Warriors.

Then there's the dual international who will leave her sons behind for a couple of months to try to make it under the bright lights.

Her mother will look after the kids in Melbourne while she's in Wollongong.

In the meantime she has previously quit corporate work and a job as a youth worker to earn coin on the railways in the middle of the freezing winter nights in Melbourne. The work's casual, it pays well and importantly allows her to train and travel if she needs to.

On a modest deal for the NRL women's league, Schwalger is already searching for employment in Wollongong when she shifts north.

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"I’ll work at Macca’s if I have to," she said. "We’re not getting $100,000 contracts so I’ve got a chance to pick up work during normal business hours. I’ve got to make sure my kids are good and once they’re good I can work everything else out around them."

Schwalger, who has played rugby union for Australia and league for Samoa and is a cousin of St George Illawarra centre Tim Lafai, knows a few mothers in the different NRL teams. But when you have two sons, Diego (11) and Malaki (10), who are almost teenagers, it's an altogether different sacrifice to try to make it at the elite level.

"I had them very young," Schwalger said. "I know a few mums as well – probably about one or two each team – but they’ll obviously be locally based to be near their kids.

"I hope it does inspire other women that they can do this. When I catch up with other girls at other training sessions, their excuses are nothing and I just say, 'I’ve got two boys and if I can do it you guys can too.'

"I had to talk to my boys and my mum and I know for myself to get the benefits I’ve got to move [to Wollongong], be there day in day out to get the benefits of training and to get to know the girls to really make the most of it.

"It’s only eight weeks and that’s how I sold it to them. It’s only short term and not forever."

But it might make an impact lasting just as long if a mother-of-two living away from her sons can make it in the short-term competition.

A rugby union-mad Schwalger, whose brother John won two caps for the All Blacks, played with boys when she was younger until a rival school official complained girls shouldn't be pitted against the other sex. She had to stop.

In between stints in almost foreign rugby league markets such as Perth and Melbourne, she has craved a competition to play in. Any competition. She's found the one she wanted. And her boys now know it's the right one.