Girls Interrupting..... Call for submissions!
What more needs to be said?
Its name takes inspiration from the iconic Girl, Interrupted (1999), itself based on Susanna Kaysen’s memoir. For many Neurodivergent+ women and femme people, it has become a touchstone—a story that raises difficult questions about diagnosis, institutionalisation, gender and the consequences of failing to meet society’s expectations of femininity.
Historically, countless women were labelled hysterical, mad, difficult or disordered simply because they did not conform. Some needed support; many were misunderstood. All too often, their voices were dismissed in favour of systems that claimed to know them better than they knew themselves.
So…
In 2026, what’s really changed?
Hopefully, our agency.
Girls Interrupting seeks to bring together a chorus of Neurodivergent+ femme voices that refuse to be spoken for. Voices that interrupt assumptions about gender, diagnosis, creativity and what it means to exist outside expectation.
This is an exciting time for Neurodivergent culture. More of us are finding one another, building communities, sharing language and discovering ways to articulate experiences that previously felt isolated or impossible to describe. Ideas such as neuroqueering, Autigender and other intersections between neurodivergence and gender are opening entirely new conversations.
There is still stigma.
Many of us know what it feels like to be described as…
Too loud.
Too quiet.
Too emotional.
Too blunt.
Too awkward.
Too intense.
Too sensitive.
Too much.
The list is as endless as it is contradictory.
As a Neurodivergent woman, I’ve spent years trying to understand where my own identity ends and society’s expectations begin. I know I am not alone.
This anthology exists because I want us to write ourselves rather than continually being written by others.
Who is it for?
This anthology welcomes submissions from anyone who identifies with, has identified with, or has been shaped by experiences of femininity or feminine categorisation.
We warmly welcome submissions from cis, trans, non-binary, genderfluid and intersex Neurodivergent+ writers.
What can I submit?
Almost anything.
Short stories.
Poetry.
Essays.
Creative non-fiction.
Memoir.
Hybrid writing.
Experimental work.
Plays.
Flash fiction.
Fragments.
Something you’ve just finished writing.
Something sitting forgotten in a drawer.
Previously published work is also welcome, provided you retain the rights to republish it.
You could send…
• a surreal story about an alien beauty pageant
• poems about romance and cloud watching
• a play exploring masking
• extracts from a memoir
• speculative fiction
• gothic horror
• magical realism
• something impossible to categorise.
The point isn’t the genre.
The point is you.
I don’t want polished perfection.
I want honesty.
I want weirdness.
I want tenderness.
I want rage.
I want contradiction.
I want joy.
I want stories that don’t apologise for existing.
Whether you are unmasking, remasking, inventing, remembering, screaming, whispering, laughing or mourning—
the page is yours.
Write it.
Then send it to us.
Submissions & enquiries:
📧 mixmatched.sw@gmail.com
Deadline: 31 August 2026