Writing as Therapy Doesn’t Mean Bad Writing

By Nancy McCabe

“She’s just writing for therapy,” we sometimes say, meaning that the work seems self-indulgent or self-pitying or self-absorbed. But using writing to merely wallow or vent is not, according to research, all that therapeutic—as studies have shown, it is writing to find meaning that boosts immune function and promotes healing.

Nevertheless, I feel like I’m breaking a taboo when I make the shamefully unartistic admission that I find writing to be therapeutic.

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