The Pen Has Healing Power

This article on writing therapy was published in The Boston Globe on March 23,1989. For quick relief from emotional pain, follow the writing exercise prescribed below. 

Researchers have discovered what journal writers have long intuited: Writing is good for what ails you.

While putting pen to paper won’t cure schizophrenia or heart disease, writing about your deepest thoughts and feelings may help alleviate depression, prevent colds, boost your immune system and bolster the psyche.

James Pennebaker, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas, was one of the first to look at the therapeutic benefits of writing. On a hunch, he recruited a group of college students to write continuously for 20 minutes on four consecutive days in the mid-1980s.

Half were asked to write their deepest thoughts and feelings about a personal trauma; the others were asked to write about superficial topics. The first group felt much worse immediately after the exercise, but then for the next six weeks they reported improved moods, a more positive outlook, and fewer visits to doctors.

Since then, researchers world-wide have conducted dozens of similar studies with diverse groups. Writing about emotionally charged issues has been found to improve the physical and mental health of grade-school children, nursing-home residents, arthritis sufferers, medical students, maximum-security prisoners, new mothers, and rape victims.

Researchers say it can reduce anxiety and depression, improve grades in college, and aid people in securing jobs.

“Exploring your deepest thoughts and feelings is not a panacea,” says Pennebaker, author of “Opening Up: The Healing Power of Expressing Emotions.”

“If you’re coping with death, divorce or other tragedy, you will not feel instantly better after writing,” he says. “Writing should be viewed more like preventive maintenance – an inexpensive simple and sometimes painful way to help maintain our health.

Why therapeutic writing works is still puzzling, but how it affects the body is palpable to writers and measurable by researchers. Immediately after writing, blood pressure and heart rate decrease and the skin is drier, all suggesting relaxation. While calming down physically in the face of getting emotionally stirred up may seem contradictory, this very phenomenon observed in people taking lie detector tests was what got Pennebaker interested in therapeutic issues of writing.

Over a longer term, writing has been shown to improve immune function (i.e., white blood cell count) and reduce rates of minor illness, such as colds and flu.

Pennebaker believes that writing affords people insight into what are typically incomprehensible events, such as a cancer diagnosis or loss of a child, and that it reduces psychological distress by getting rid of intrusive thoughts about such events.

Stephen Lepore, a psychology professor and researcher at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Melon, doesn’t agree exactly. Writing does not get rid of intrusive thoughts, he says, but it does reduce their harmful effects.

“You still may have nightmares because of a trauma,” Lepore says, “but with less negative impact.”

Putting feelings into words is hardly new. Freud’s talking cure required that patients do just that aloud, says Jane Katims, a psychotherapist and clinical fellow at the Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis.

“Writing is a wonderful way to discover things,” Katim says. “If you let yourself write openly, it’ll take you places you’ve never imagined.”

Katims doesn’t require her psychotherapy clients to write, but she finds writing a useful therapeutic tool for those who like to write, especially between sessions. “There’s an urgency to writing,” she says, “and unlike the telephone, clients can go on and on on paper.” Clients also bring writing to sessions to read aloud or use as a springboard for discussion with Katims.

The uses of writing therapy are as varied as talk therapy. Psychotherapists use it to treat everything from anxiety and depression to sexual abuse and post-traumatic stress disorder. The benefits cut across all ages, races and intelligence levels, but seem to benefit men slightly more than women, probably because men generally are less likely to talk about their feelings.

But writing has shown little effect on habitual health problems, including smoking and overeating, and clearly won’t help people who dislike writing.

While it is no substitute for psychotherapy or psychiatric treatment, writing has its advantages. Alan Hunter, Curry College English professor and author of the “Therapeutic Uses of Writing,” says, “It’s quick, free, you can do it yourself, anytime, anywhere.” Without judgment, embarrassment or distrust.

“Writing hands the power back to the patient,” Hunter says. “The patient isn’t passive, as in ‘getting shrunk,’ but can be an active explorer beyond the boundaries of the usual therapeutic hour.”

A long line of professional writers – Eugene O”Neill, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Sylvia Plath, for example – have written about their emotional pain and produced major literary works.

Unlike Prozac, the side effects of writing are nil, the risks minimal. The main risk appears to be falling out of love. Writing about matters of the heart, (love letters, journal entries) has been shown to cool the fires of desire. Of course, if you’re trying to get over an old love, this could help speed recovery. Pennebaker doesn’t say much about writer’s block, but, certainly, the very attempt to write has been a famous source of psychic trauma.

Pennebaker recommends writing for 20 minutes non-stop, without thought to grammar or spelling, a minimum of four consecutive days. People who like to write can benefit from regular writing sessions. Simply venting or complaining on paper won’t help; the gains come from writing your deepest thoughts and feelings about matters that dominate your thinking and dreaming.

While some therapists encourage clients to bring their writing to sessions, Pennebaker recommends sharing it with no one, even destroying it afterward.

“Planning to show your writing to someone can affect your mind-set while writing,” he says. “Make yourself the audience.”

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