This is an article I came across, that discusses “expressive writing,” which is different from “journaling”. This article was adapted from one by M. Pisano.

By definition, expressive writ-ing means writing only for yourself. No one else should see the writing, and it is advisable to tear it up or hide it. Some describe it as thinking on paper. Others distinguish it from journaling, a popular mind-body stress-reliever, in which people write about day-to-day activities, thoughts, and feelings. Journaling is fine, but expressive writing is more of a course correction about some thing that is bothering you. When life is going well, you do not write expressively. You write expressively when you are miserable.

Research on ex-pressive writing began in the mid-1980s and developed by acci-dent out of work on trauma. In one study, people who did not discuss their trauma went to physicians 40 percent more often than those who openly discussed their trauma did did. Keeping painful things secret poses a significant health risk.

Not that expressive writing is a cure-all. It is not a replacement for psychotherapy or counseling. Many people find relief from stress or trauma in medication, therapy, exercise, or relaxation techniques. Still, continuing research has shown that writing is effective and can produce mea-surable changes in physical and emotional health.

Expressive Writing can help with the following:

Biological: Emotional writing is associated with general enhance-ment of immune-system function. Also, researchers have found it is associated with better lung func-tion in asthma patients, lower pain and disease severity in ar-thritis patients, higher white blood cell counts in AIDS patients and less sleep disruption in patients with metastatic cancers. Immediately after writing about emotional topics, people have improved stress indicators, includ-ing lower blood pressure and heart-rate levels.

Psychological: Immediately after writing about traumatic issues, people often feel sad and some cry but this feeling is short-term. Long-term, people report feeling happier and less negative.

Behavioral: Studies show that college students make better grades after expressive writing, perhaps because it boosts work-ing memory the type needed to deal with complex tasks. Socially, expressive writing also seems to make people better listeners, talkers and friends. After writing about their emotions, hostile angry, ruminating men were more open-minded and did better in job interviews.

So, some may wonder what is it about putting words on paper?
“It really is different from talk-ing. For one thing, it slows things down. You stand back. You are forced to orga-nize things in ways you have not done before. With this writing technique, it really forces people to link big issues in their lives with other big issues — work, re-lationships, childhood, upheavals in life.

When starting out, some advise writing for 20 minutes for four consecutive days, either on the same subject or something different. You write about something today and it makes you think about something related tomor-row. Some people will start writ-ing about something going on now and see this is related to something that happened in the past. That is one of the real beau-ties of it. In addition, because expressive writing is private, people can delve into shameful things they would never verbalize. It is very healthy to write about things you are ashamed of.

There are some caveats, if something is too painful and emotional to write about, people are advised to back off for a time and write about another subject. Also, It is potentially danger-ous to write about something more and more for weeks and months. You can overdo it and get into almost navel-gazing. And, if you have been writing for several months and you feel worse, this may not be the best strategy for you. In a study published in 1999, researcher Arthur Stone used expressive writing paradigm in a randomized study of more than 100 asthma and rheumatoid arthritis patients. Some were asked to write about major stressors or traumas in their lives, others in a control group wrote about time management. When followed up at one month and four months, lung function measured by a machine showed considerable improvement only in the (asthma) group that wrote about trauma. The change was robust, says Stone, professor of psychiatry at the State University of New York at Stony Brook Health Sciences Center. Rheumatoid arthritis patients who wrote about trauma also showed improvement. Stone notes that scientists are studying whether patients doing expressive writing have changes in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, the system that affects metabolism, immune function, and inflammation.

Bruce Rabin, professor of psychiatry and psychology at the University of Pittsburgh Health Sciences Center uses expressive writing with pa-tients who have cancer or autoimmune diseases and with peo-ple feeling stressed. He tells them to write for 15 minutes or so when something bothers them. “We’ve doing this for about three years with hundreds of peo-ple, and it is absolutely phenom-enal the effects we’re seeing with it.

They tell us the issues they were concerned about are less important. They are sleeping better. Their interactions with other people have improved.”

Tips for expressive writing are:

 Write for 20 minutes a day (more if you like)

 Write about the same thing or different things each day — a stressor, trauma or emotional problem that is personal and im-portant to you

 Write continuously without stopping or worrying about spelling and grammar. If you run out of things to say, repeat what you already wrote.

 Write only for yourself and be open and honest. Don’t show ft to anyone else

 Flip-out rule: Do not write about something it you think it will push you over the edge emotionally. Write about some-thing else and perhaps return to that subject in the future

 Expect that you may feel somewhat sad or depressed af-ter expressive writing, especially on the first or second day of writing. This feeling is usually temporary. Set aside some time after you write to reflect on the issues you’ve written about

Adapted from an article by M. Pisano, May 30, 2004.