The Held Project

11/10/2026

The Held Project exists to fulfil these needs.

At The Mum Hub Mackay by The Held Project you have access to professional and peer support, a space to put your baby down and your feet up, people with lived experience of perinatal mental health adversities, weekly groups and meet ups and a community of mums ready to be part of your village.

Thank you for your continued support of The Held Project | Mackay Perinatal Mental Health Initiative 💖

We see you.

07/10/2026

Hey all! Amanda here. Jumping on quickly to say how AMAZING the midwives are here on WHU at the base! I'm in here currently (not baby related, as much as I'd love a third!) and it's amazing seeing what you all talk to us about in action. We get SO much good feedback about the local midwives from women on our visits... So I thought I'd jump on here to give everyone the opportunity to thank their midwives/student midwives/nurses!

Have the best night x

29/09/2026

I was going to wait until we had the professional photos to say my thank yous, but I'm too excited. I'll make another post once we get those!

Thanks to all of your generosity, we were able to raise almost $25,000 on Saturday night at our ball. This is an insane amount of money. I don't have exact figures yet, but I'll get them to you!

Thank you to everyone who sponsored, everyone who bought a ticket, everyone who came to celebrate 12 months of The Held Project, and of course, the incredible team THP. This wouldn't be possible without the amazing team of volunteers on team THP.

Two people in particular I want to honour again are Chris and Tiff. Tiff does an amazing job keeping THP thriving while I am homeschooling, and Chris is the one who organised the ball pretty much entirely on her own. And then there's the amazing ladies who keep the hub running, who do visits, who helped at the ball and who are my emotional sanity in our team yaps chat (iykyk).

Thank you again to our amazing community for making Saturday night such a success. I wish I got to meet every single one of you to say thank you!

For those of you I did meet, it was so special for me hearing what you all had to say. I heard so many stories and it's an absolute honour and privilege to be able to hold space for so many women. I love you ALL and I'm so honoured to be considered a safe person for so many women. I love hearing your stories and holding space for you.

I can't wait for our charity ball next year! You all looked so beautiful and I can't wait to see your masks and dresses for our ball next year - The Queen's Masquerade.

Love you all, and thank you x

26/09/2026

26/09/2026

Can you help out this new mama?

Hi lovelies! I’m struggling to find a double pram and a baby carrier for my little ones. I also would love some toiletries for my baby and postpartum care products for me.

If you’re in the position to help, please message us 💌

24/09/2026

Officially SOLD OUT 🪩 ✨

We are beyond excited to ball with you this Saturday!

Please be sure to tag The Held Project in any posts and photos so we can reshare all the best moments from the night! Xx

22/09/2026

PLAYGROUP IN THE PARK

w/ Bianca and some of The Held Project | Mackay Perinatal Mental Health Initiative team at John Breen Park, North Mackay

⏰ 10am
🗓️ 23 September
🍌 BYO picnic basket + snacks

The Mum Hub will be closed as we prepare for The Mirror Ball this weekend 🪩✨

See you there!

20/09/2026

Less than one week to go before our SOLD OUT Mirror Ball 🪩✨

Thank you to all our sponsors for making this night possible! We are so grateful for all your support 🫶🏼

And a huge thank you to Macrossan & Amiet Solicitors, our Diamond Sponsors 💎

We can’t wait to celebrate, dance, eat and mingle with you all!

💖💖💖

17/09/2026

My youngest daughter turned four on Wednesday. It's been a time of reflection for me, and I wanted to share some of that with you.

Georgie Grace was born at exactly 37 weeks on the 16th September, 2022. I had fallen pregnant when I was 12 months postpartum and I was beside myself. I was terrified to have another baby.

I had to go off my medication, and I had not even recovered from postnatal depression with my first yet. That pregnancy was turbulent, I have cervical incompetence so my body began to evict her at 27 weeks, I spent months in hospital at GCUH, away from my home in Lismore and my eldest, Sarah, and my husband, Jesse. It was horrendous.

At 34 weeks and 4cm dilated, I went into an episode of perinatal psychosis. I began losing my absolute, ever loving sh*t (no better words, honestly) at the obstetricians in Lismore Base in the maternity assessment unit, and told all the women in the MAU that they were going to have their babies k*lled by the obstetricians. I was genuinely terrified and lost total touch with reality. I was put under a 3 day involuntary treatment order and locked in the maternity ward while I was in prodromal labour, an insane amount of pain, and could give birth at any moment.

This is what led to the birth of The Held Project.

All I wanted was for someone to come and bring me a coffee. I was desperate for a barista made coffee after drinking instant on the ward for days. But mostly, I wanted a mum who had been through what I've been through to sit with me, have a coffee with me, and tell me that I'm still a good mum.

I spoke to a social worker, the midwives, a psychiatrist... Nothing felt remotely close to what it would have been like if I had a mum to sit with and chat to.

I pitched the idea to one of my beautiful friends from back home. Visiting mums in the hospital with complex pregnancies and mental health issues with a coffee and a bag of self care, rather than the baby essentials we got in NSW and the lousy bounty bags. Focused on mum. We chatted about how it would work and I put a pin in it for later.

Fast forward to 2025, and I managed to birth The Held Project here in Mackay. We started visiting mums in hospital bringing coffee and nappy bags with lovely things in them - not essentials, just luxe mum goodies. I wanted mum to feel like she was loved. The Held Project just transformed dramatically from there after we received a lovely (not-so-lovely) comment from another charity that apparently delivered nappy bags of essentials to mums in crisis in QLD hospitals - I had never heard of it as I was from NSW. So I redesigned.

Community visits, coffee, personalised totes and luxe goodies. And most importantly, chatting to a mum who had been through it too.

Over the last 12 months and a bit, I've had people jump on board, come and go, mums reach out, sponsorships, you name it. The Held Project has just evolved as I've needed it to, and when we opened The Mum Hub Mackay in April, we stepped up another level.

In the last few months I've taken on homeschooling my girls. It's so nice to be able to have capacity to want to be around them full time after being so miserable about parenting for so long. Thanks to the amazing team I have, I've been able to step right back and be there for my babies when they've needed me. It's why you haven't seen my face much - I've been in mum mode, right where I've wanted to be for almost 6 years since having my first baby, perinatal mental health issues stole my joy for such a long time that I'm only just out of it now. I'm where I wanted to be all along. Present, with my girls.

In this time, the lovely Tiff has stepped up, and her role will soon be expanding to more of a boss babe role. I'm excited for this. It's nice to share success and love mums, especially with one of my best friends.

So now, The Held Project has become huge. We've grown exponentially, helped so many mums, and held many beautiful babies while their mums received the love they needed and drank a hot coffee.

Thank you, mothers of Mackay, for letting me love you for the last 12 months. Thank you for letting my team love you. Thank you for letting us hold you and support you.

This is your reminder that it does get better, that you are loved, that you're never alone, and that you can turn your tragedy into something absolutely beautiful.

Sending love to you ALL today.

🤍 Amanda x