To Port Hedland, and the people who call it home.

Being honest, I was slightly apprehensive flying in, after having had a really impactful but incredibly heavy experience in 2025. I’m not blind to the challenges of regional WA, and you damn well best believe I’d done my research ahead of it… but statistics don’t prepare you for the experience of sitting across from someone who is carrying so much, so determinedly, and still making space for a stranger to understand.

You did that. Over and over again.

What I found in Port Hedland was something I struggle to name without it sounding like a platitude, so I’ll try to be specific. It was Kesi-Maree, whose knowledge runs deep and whose values run deeper. It was Valerie Riley, who is doing work that would exhaust most people, and doing it with a generosity that humbles me. It was the team at Headspace, who are fighting barriers that should not exist, stepping into roles and realities they shouldn’t have to, and who have not let that stop them from being the most purpose-driven humans I have had the privilege of sitting with. It was the folks at Hope, who gave us thirty minutes of honesty and warmth as we dropped in unannounced, without blinking. It was Katrina Sharp shaping what mental health support looks like in this region and seems to know exactly what that responsibility means. It was Nat Middleton, who spoke openly and candidly like a friend I’ve known for years. It was every person in the room on Thursday who brought their experience, their frustration and their hope to a conversation about complaints and advocacy, and reminded me that imperfect advocacy is still advocacy worth making.

I came to Port Hedland knowing it would be heavy. What I didn’t fully anticipate was how deeply it would fill me.

There is something about community in regional Australia that Perth doesn’t replicate. A collectiveness. A sense that people are genuinely in it together, not as a concept but as a daily lived reality. That is something we need to protect and that I will return to as an anchor.

For all those out there in positions of power… it is also worth resourcing far better than currently is being done.

Port Hedland, what you are contending with is not fair. The barriers to mental health support, to adequate services, to funding, to visibility are not proportionate to the need, and they are not the result of any failure on your part. You are not underserved because you are not worth serving, you are underserved because s

ystems are slow, inequitable, and often blind to the communities furthest from power.

I left Port Hedland exhausted, and I left it certain that I will come back, whatever it takes (but, pretty please, don’t make it as hard as it was for me to get to Albany, there’s just one of me!). But also, the people I met there deserve every bit of fight I have in me.

Thank you for trusting me with your stories. Thank you for your time, your honesty, your warmth. Thank you for reminding me, at a moment when I genuinely needed it, exactly why I do this.

I’ll see you again.

With deep respect and gratitude,

Rachael