The Problem
We have changed the way we live. We haven't changed what mothers need.
For generations, and across cultures, mothers have been surrounded by other people during pregnancy, birth and early motherhood. Mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunties, friends and neighbours shared knowledge, held babies, helped with practical tasks and cared for the mother while she recovered and learned to care for her child.
Modern motherhood can look very different.
Today, a mother may leave hospital and return to a home where she spends much of the day alone with her baby. Her partner may quickly return to work. Her parents may live in another town or another country. Her friends are working or raising their own families. At the same time, she may be recovering from birth, feeding around the clock, severely sleep deprived and trying to navigate one of the biggest transitions of her life.
We have become very good at telling mothers to ask for help.
HELD asks a different question: what if meaningful support was simply there?
Why this matters
Research increasingly confirms something women have intuitively understood for generations: the environment surrounding a mother matters.
Low social support is recognised as a risk factor for poor maternal mental health. Loneliness, sleep disruption, overwhelming caregiving demands and lack of practical support can all contribute to maternal distress.
HELD is not, and will never be, a replacement for medical or mental health care. Postpartum depression, anxiety, psychosis and other perinatal mental health conditions are real clinical conditions that deserve appropriate professional treatment.
But clinical care and community care solve different problems.
A mother can leave an appointment with excellent professional support and still return home to eight hours alone with a baby.
We believe she deserves both.
There is another generation that needs connection too.
What if two generations could give each other exactly what they need?
HELD is not only about mothers.
Within our communities are women with decades of experience, knowledge and care to give. Their own children may have grown. Their grandchildren may live far away. Some are retired after lives filled with work and family. Some miss being needed. Some simply want meaningful ways to remain connected and contribute to the community around them.
At the same time, younger mothers are searching online for reassurance, companionship and the wisdom that previous generations often found within their own families and neighbourhoods.
We want to bring those generations together.
Our vision is for HELD to be supported by a community of carefully selected and supported female volunteers, including mothers, grandmothers, retired women and others who believe in what we are building.
The benefits can flow both ways. Research into healthy ageing consistently points to the importance of social connection, meaningful participation and purpose in later life.
Perhaps we are looking at two generations who have something profoundly valuable to give one another.
It starts in Kerikeri.
Our first goal is to establish a dedicated HELD home in Kerikeri, a beautiful, welcoming space with comfortable communal areas, a kitchen, showers and private rooms where mothers can rest.
The Kerikeri home will allow us to pilot the HELD model, learn, measure its impact and, we hope, create something that can eventually be replicated in communities throughout New Zealand.
Kerikeri is where the village begins.
Who's behind HELD?
Hi, I'm Nicky.
I'm a mother of three and have spent more than a decade working in the parenting space, listening to thousands of women talk honestly about motherhood.
Again and again I've heard about exhaustion, isolation, overwhelm and the desperate need for the kind of support that simply isn't available to many mothers anymore.
I also bring more than a decade of experience building and running a successful business, developing services for families and turning ideas into sustainable organisations.
HELD brings those worlds together: my experience, my belief in the power of women and my absolute conviction that we can do motherhood better than this.
Help us build the first HELD home.
HELD is currently seeking funding, sponsorship and community support to establish our first home in Kerikeri.
Every contribution brings us closer to opening a door that a mother can walk through and know that, for the next little while, she doesn't have to do motherhood alone.
