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2001-06-10 | 11:40 a.m.

I just got an e-mail saying I got accepted into that attachment parenting ring I wrote about. Now I feel sheepish. Did a little bird pass the word, I wonder? If so, they are being gracious about it, which I appreciate, so I will put the code up tout suite.

I read an article in Poets & Writers yesterday that I found interesting in relation to keeping an online diary. It was about a study that measured how helpful a certain style of writing can be for healing the emotional pain borne of past traumatic events. The study found that it was not helpful simply to write about past traumas, nor was it therapeutic merely to write about the way these events made you feel. Only when you describe the event AND the way it made you feel, forming a complete, cohesive narrative, does the healing begin: "The more writing succeeds as narrative---by being detailed, organized, compelling, vivid, and lucid---the more benefits will be derived." And according to them, it's surprisingly efficacious---as good as therapy. So take that to heart, d'landers. By using Diaryland judiciously, we are saving ourselves money on therapy.

The article was part of a larger section called "In Truth, Beauty: Writing as a Healing Art" and was called "How Telling Our Stories Transforms Our Lives" by Louise deSalvo. This was in the May/June 2001 issue of P&W.

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