Telling your story
Dorset Mind uses it’s blog space as a way of telling real-life stories from within our community. You can get involved by blogging/vlogging in order to share your story and to give readers an insight into what it’s like to live with a mental health problem.
Hearing or watching the story of someone who might be going through a similar experience, can have a profound impact, and truly help someone on their journey to recovery. By encouraging more people to speak up, listen to stories and counteract the stigma around mental health, we can all work together towards better mental health in Dorset.
Getting Started
Here are some ideas and topics that you might like to blog about:
- Anxiety, stress and depression
- Taking medication
- Suicide
- Using advocacy or crisis services
- Staying safe online
- Budgeting and managing money
- How food and physical activity affects your mood
- Relaxation and managing stress
- Mindfulness, ecotherapy and alternative therapies
- Seeking diagnosis
- Living with a mental health problem like bipolar, borderline personality disorder, an eating disorder or any other kind of mental health problem.
- Coping with a long-term health condition & mental health
- Living with a disability & mental health
- Being LGBTIQ+ & mental health
- Being part of a minority group, such as BME, and mental health
Your chosen topic can be outside of the list above, but hopefully this list will give you some ideas.
Format
Word count: Try to aim between 500-1000 words. Adjust the length of your vlog according to the platform it will be shared upon (please check with us if you’re unsure). We advise generally to keep them under two minutes if possible to hold people’s attention. Add subtitles if possible.
Please try and mention your topic and relevant key words throughout your blog. This helps your blog to feature higher in search engines and so it will be more likely to be seen by a larger audience.
Try to focus on key moments and resist the temptation to tell your whole life story. You might like to write a series of blogs, in which case you will have more time and space to reflect.
A few tips and guidelines
- Before you begin, ask yourself how you are, and whether you’re up to writing about your experience. These guidelines are for people who are well enough to tell their stories. Your mental health and wellbeing should always come first, so please do seek help via our support pages if you need to
- When discussing suicide, please do not discuss method or any details. Read more on why this is important here
- Always use non-stigmatising, non-discriminative language
- A good blog has a mix of personal experience alongside wider evidence and statistics. Research and use up–to–date facts as we will need to check that these are correct before publishing. Add your references at the bottom of your blog to help us refer back to them
- Focus on what you know and try not to make any assumptions within your writing about things that you haven’t experienced yourself
- Try to signpost to how people can find support. Bear in mind what services we offer and how we work to support people with mental health problems. If readers feel triggered, then they will have somewhere to turn to for support
- If you can include tips and tricks that are personal to you and that you have found helpful, then try to include them
- Try not to avoid the difficult bits, particularly if you think it might help someone. But always put your wellbeing first
And finally…
Thank you for agreeing to share your story and for this to be published on the Dorset Mind website blog!
We can’t guarantee that we will publish your blog and if we do, we may need to edit it. We can’t always publish straight away, but we will do our best to find a slot in our schedule as soon as we can.
You can request to change or remove this information at any time by contacting marketing@dorsetmind.uk
We might need to contact you about your story, so please send your details to us at the address above. We may re-use your blog, or quotes from your blog, in public relations (PR), electronic media and promotional materials.
You can find out more about how we look after your information by reading our Privacy Policy here.
