A couple of years ago my wife, a freelance writer, was conducting a phone interview while I worked in the next room. I overheard her say something that caught my attention: “why do you think that writing helps people, Dr. Pennebaker?” I immediately ran into the room and started scribbling down additional questions that I wanted her to ask. She laughed and then had to explain her husband’s academic-fanboy behavior to her interviewee. James Pennebaker is a fellow psychologist, and the father of expressive writing studies. In this approach, patients are given a blank sheet of paper with a general instruction like “write down your thoughts and feelings about [a particular event].” The idea behind this intervention is that writing about a traumatic experience might provide emotional relief and a chance to work through the event, resulting in a consolidated sense of self and an ability to let go of the things that were written. More detailed instructions for therapeutic writing can be f