Write for us
Guidelines and sign up form
We pride ourselves on being an inclusive platform to share the voices of a diverse range of parents and professionals. We have created these guidelines for you to read through and then please complete the form at the end if you’d like to write for us.
WHAT TO WRITE ABOUT
You are welcome to write about anything at all related to birth or the circumstances around birth and birth trauma in particular. We just ask that you don't share any information about anyone without their explicit permission, and that - if you are a professional - you don't share case study material.
Talk about something you’ve been thinking about recently, post about recent news pertaining to birth, events or articles you’ve come across or simply just say hello and let people know that they are not alone and we have lots of resources on the site to help them if they are suffering.
If you are a professional and offer any treatment or therapy, please be aware we will add a line to your content 'At @birthbetter we are open to all therapies and holistic treatments and believe each person's journey to recovery is unique. We do recommend as a first course that those with trauma inform themselves about the evidence-based treatments for trauma and clarify the qualifications and supervision structures in place for any practitioner, in order to make an informed choice about their care'. This is to ensure that the safety of our followers is always paramount and is not in any way a comment on your expertise!
HOW IT WORKS
We welcome people to either:
Take over our Instagram account for a day (usually this is for experts and professionals only)
Write a piece for our blog (a shorter version of your words is also shared on our social media platforms)
If you complete the form below, we will be in touch with you directly. We will ask you to write a draft of your content and share a selection of photos which match your words. We will share a guiding checklist which will help you draft your piece. Please note: we have a lot of brilliant requests to share content so we don't chase our contributors for their work.
Once we have a draft of your words, we will set a date for your words to be published online. If it takes a while to get your content together, it's absolutely fine. We're not going anywhere so don't put too much pressure on yourself and please look after yourself in the process.
AN IMPORTANT NOTE ON TONE
While we value the diversity of voices and experiences in the group, it’s important to keep a consistent tone to our approach. Lots of the topics we cover can be incredibly emotive for both us and the audience, so please remember to take a breath if things are ever getting heated and step away if you need. We are creating a safe space for discussion and we must encourage polite and respectful conversation.
We are: Supportive - Calm - Fair - Gentle - Collaborative - Open - Kind - Interested - Thoughtful - Respectful
We are NOT: Combative - Aggressive - Sarcastic - Accusatory - Finger-pointing - Adversarial - Inflammatory
PLEASE TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF
If you’re writing about your personal experience of trauma, we ask you to think carefully about this. To ensure you're well looked after in this process, we ask people to consider:
Would it feel safe for you to share your story?
Would taking more time to heal benefit you first?
Do you have people to talk to if the process feels re-triggering?
We can't answer these questions for you so please take your time to think about it.
READY? COMPLETE AND SEND THIS FORM