Memoir as Healing

There are five main beneficial healing qualities that memoir writing contains.

1. Writing is reflective because it allows you time to process your thoughts. I see it as filling in the blanks or putting puzzle pieces together. For instance, when I was going through cancer treatment, I had taken on this new identity of “cancer patient”. It wasn’t an identity that I ever imagined I would be associating with myself, much less in my 30s. The puzzle piece of “cancer patient” didn’t fit with the other pieces of my identity that I feel intrinsically as a part of me, like “mother” or “teacher” or “writer”. Placing this piece into my writing, I realized that I could adapt it to “cancer advocate”. That was a role that felt more comfortable to me, in fitting with my natural yearning to learn and to provide guidance for others.
2. Writing is meditative because it improves your mindfulness and self-awareness. I view the reflective quality of writing as more of a looking back at something you’ve been through while the meditative quality is more of a grounding in your own present reality. Our difficult experiences can be blocks that prohibit us from growth or stepping stones that bring us closer to who we are meant to be, and writing can help us to see that distinction.
3. This brings us to the transformative quality of writing. Writing in general creates a tangible product out of memories and thoughts. Memoir writing related to a traumatic or difficult experience takes something negative and transforms it into something productive. (Note this doesn’t make the experience “positive” or lead us into the toxic positivity of making the best out of difficult situations; you can create a painfully poignant poem about an experience and it is still a productive transformation of that experience even if the poem may evoke sad or distressing emotions for a reader.)
4. Writing is calming as it helps us to make sense of something. It reduces stress and helps to slow down our thoughts. When engaging in focused writing, you can also find comfort in word sounds, structural patterns, or repetitive motion, especially with handwriting. I find that many proven physical health benefits tie into the calming element of memoir writing, including “improved immune system functioning, reduced blood pressure, improved lung function, improved liver function, improved overall mood, reduced depressive symptoms, reduced avoidance symptoms, improved working memory, reduced absenteeism from work, quicker re-employment after job loss, improved sporting performance, [and] improved social skills” (Baikie and Wilhelm).
5. Finally, memoir writing is uniting. We build connections with others who have a shared experience, both by reading the stories of others and by sharing our own. While going through cancer treatment, I scarfed down all the cancer books I could get a hold of. It was like some wild need to connect to others in the cancer world. Some of these were epics that I bravely soldiered through, like Siddhartha Mukherjee’s “The Emperor of All Maladies” (Mukherjee’s IQ must be, like, 170 at least and mine is…not that), while others I devoured voraciously like Kris Carr’s “Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips” (mostly because it was the first relatable book I read about cancer and people in their 20s and 30s dealing with it). [I read many others and will likely put together a young adult cancer reading list when I get around to it, which I will then link here.] When I realized the benefit of sharing my own story, I had a hell of a time finding a literary magazine in the cancer muggle world that would share a story about a 32-year-old with cancer. Then, I found my people. I published “Heartbeats of Chemo” in Elephants & Tea (a magazine and community dedicated to young people with cancer) and “An Unlikely Ally” in Wildfire Magazine (the only literary magazine for women “too young” for breast cancer). Both reading about others’ stories and sharing our own can be uniting in many ways.

Finally, here’s the live recording of my workshop from the other day. I open up with a bit of my experience, talk to others in the live workshop, and then read “Heartbeats of Chemo” before I get into more of these five key benefits. May your own writing be healing and beautiful!