Healing Through Memoir: The Power of Writing

For many memoirists, writing is a heavy yet healing journey. They are willing to look back, for they know that the unexamined life isn’t worth living. They understand that pain, hardship, and loss often come with something else: the realization that their story is now one they can live with and fully embrace. Hopefully, the regrets have been parsed and written down, and the journey leads toward acceptance that life is both trial and triumph, not only for them but for those they write about.

In July, I celebrated the 16^th anniversary of the publication of my memoir Again in a Heartbeat. I wrote that book quickly, without a lot of editing, as a child, a woman journalist, and a bereaved wife. Over and over again, the memoir has given me the gift of fellowship with others who have read the book. They have told me that my story is much like their story, and is—at least to me—our story. A few readers suggested that the book be used as a tool for group therapy for couples struggling with a terminal disease. (I tried that, but was unsuccessful.)

My memoir journey might really have begun when I was growing up in a small leafy suburb outside Philadelphia. I was aware even as a little girl that people wear masks, that their true selves hid behind closed doors, whether it was to impress the Joneses or because they felt it was unseemly to expose their alcoholism or domestic violence.

One woman I remember well. She was the epitome of the unhappy housewife, overweight and with a face as plain as a pancake. She took out her anger on me, a nine-year-old girl. She blamed me for something I didn’t do, and I ran home crying to my mother when the other children shunned me. The indelible impression this experience left on me was that adults are not to be trusted. Authority was not to be trusted. People had ulterior motives and were capable of doing damage to the most young and impressionable.

As I grew older, I knew I wanted to be a journalist. I could challenge authorities. I could question what others weren’t. The limitations of journalism, however, meant never writing about the people I knew best or even that parochial neighborhood I grew up in.  

The joy of creative nonfiction became writing about people and places that framed my story, but were also their story and our story. I began to understand that motivation was complex and that life is never black or white but shades of gray.

But what of those whose “stories” ended abruptly? Those who died too young, or suffered an untimely death? Are their stories forgotten? This is really what writing offers many: an opportunity to keep alive the story of someone greatly loved. Chronicling the death of my husband, John Cavalieri, who died three weeks after his 47^th birthday, opened the door for keeping his memory alive, putting into words that he, too, walked this earth.

Those who want religion to “explain” this tragedy of early death are sometimes a bit annoying and condescending. They want us to understand that even the purest human who ever walked the earth was spat upon and died an unjust and horrible death, so accept it. “Faith Allows for Hardship” was the topic of a recent church lecture. After all, it makes sense intellectually and is a matter of faith, for sure. But emotionally it is hard to come to grips with. Enjoying the beauty of each day, finding gratitude in the unexpected and extraordinary, and accepting that life is a mystery are ways I cope.

Then again, when we lose someone we loved, our own selfishness kicks in. Life didn’t turn out the way we had hoped, dreamed, or expected. It was a betrayal by someone we trusted. How could this happen to me?

Maybe the answer lies in community, in being part of a writing group where all of us write stories that resonate on some level. Group discussion after a piece has been read opens up opportunities to reflect on their own stories. Our Women’s Writing Circle celebrates its 17th anniversary this November.

And so I continue to live not a life unexamined, but one better understood through writing, an ongoing healing tool that my story is their story and our story.

I invite you to reflect on your own experiences. How has writing helped you process regrets or move toward acceptance?