PERSONAL STORIES

You can write a piece of prose (written text) specifically about your own personal journey with PTSD. Up to around 1500 words. Please also send a writers' biography and any contact/social media details you don't mind being published with it. If it makes it easier for you, we can e-mail you a list of general questions, which you can adapt according to your own personal circumstances and experiences. You can also submit up to SIX poems about PTSD to run alongside your personal story.

Guidelines

It is undeniable that putting thoughts, feelings and emotions into words, on paper, can be both therapeutic and an incredibly effective method of self-help and healing. However it is vitally important that you ONLY write about the things you are comfortable sharing with other people, and that you are OK writing about.

We cannot re-publish poetry and personal journeys if they have already been published in any of our other books. However, poetry that has been published on this website (but not in our books) can be re-published in PTSD, but please re-submit them with an updated bio/contact details, and following the guidelines detailed here.

NOTE:  We often have young people reading and contributing to our website and titles, so NO swearing or profanities of any kind, or anything of an adult nature. Any emails containing these items will be immediately deleted, we will delete you from our database, and you will not be able to contribute to further titles. Find alternative words to describe your emotions!

CONDITIONS OF SUBMISSIONS: By submitting you agree for us to publish your work in PTSD, on this website, and on our Facebook page. You can submit under a pseudonym, or anonymously if you prefer. However, you do retain copyright and are free to publish your work anywhere else, and at any time after publication with us - we believe words about mental health issues should be read as widely as possible! We can also accept previously published work, as long as it credits where and when it was previously published, and that we have permission to re-publish.

Please try to send your submission/s altogether within one email, or as a .doc attachment to: Robin@PoetryForMentalHealth.org.

Please do not send poetry as a pdf file though, as they are sometimes difficult to cut and paste while keeping the correct format.

VERY IMPORTANT: Please put PTSD in the subject line so we don't get muddled up with other submissions - we get lots of poems sent to us every week and we might miss your submission to the book if it is not properly labelled.

We will normally acknowledge your submission within a few days, but please be patient - Poetry for Mental Health is run voluntarily and it can sometimes take a while to get to everyone!

IMPORTANT: If you have received an acceptance email regarding your submissions, you cannot then change or withdraw your submission, as to save time post-deadline, we immediately place all accepted submissions directly into the paperback and Kindle formats ready for publishing (hence we are able to publish very soon after deadline date). So make sure your submission is publication ready.

ALSO VERY IMPORTANT: We DO NOT send out complimentary author's copies of the paperback; with so many authors from so many countries, firstly it would be logistically impossible, and secondly extremely expensive! Poetry for Mental Health receives no grants, and any profits we do make from the book go straight back into promoting and publishing poetry for mental health. However, we will of course, send a complimentary PDF e-book to everyone contributing.

Any questions? Contact us.

Get writing!!!!