The healing power of writing

Writing is a creative act relying on faith, and nothing can heal the spirit like creativity and faith.— Barbara Abercrombie

I have been reading books about writing. I read that to be a good writer, one should read good literature and let one’s mind be, as it were, like a safari — an open range for ideas. So I read fiction, novels, and essays of famous and top-drawer authors.

I read Sandra Cisneros’ stunning vignettes, The House on Mango Street; Russell Baker’s funny and skillfully written autobiography, Growing Up, about his childhood and which earned him the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Biography.  I give deference to Susan Orleans because she combines fine journalism with engaging storytelling in her best-selling The Orchid Thief, a book about an obsessed man’s ventures into the Fakahatchee swamp in Florida to find the Ghost Orchid. I steep myself in the voices of these authors to find my own writing voice, hoping that by imbibing their works their literary genius would rub off in me. 

Then, I came across this book: Writing Out the Storm — Reading and Writing Your Way Through Serious Illness or Injury by Barbara Abercrombie.  As the title suggests, this book is powerful and deeply inspirational for anyone coping with serious illness or serious injury, using writing as therapy, a way to deal emotionally with life-threatening illness, and a tool for finding a voice in a powerless and voiceless situation.  Writing helps; it gives control and understanding.  There is power in words. Writing heals; it gives order to the great mess of life. Writing down the details of an experience can reveal the meaning of what one has been through and give it clarity. There is power in shared experience. 

Abercrombie is a breast cancer survivor herself.  The idea for the book started in a writing workshop she started for the Wellness Community in Los Angeles.  The people in the workshop, including Abercrombie, had either recovered from cancer, were currently in treatment, or were caregivers.

In this tome she tells about her fear of death, her anger at the indignity of her helpless situation, her family’s love and devotion while she is undergoing cancer treatment.  She gives insights and finds humor even in seemingly grief-stricken circums-tances. She offers stories, excerpts from the writings of other authors and celebrities who have suffered from illnesses or serious injuries like Raymond Carver, Stephen King and Christopher Reeve. 

She also provides the responses of her workshop participants to her writing prompts, which invite them (and the readers) to explore their own journey and writing:  Write about your anger, air it all out on the page,  write notes to God or to the gods…or To Whom It May Concern. Write about faith. There is no right or wrong way to write.  Whether you call it writing in a journal or keeping a notebook…just begin.

I don’t have a serious illness,  I haven’t suffered any traumatic injury (thank you, Lord), and I have never been hospitalized. But I am drawn to this book because it is about writing. I enjoy reading again and again excerpts from writers (famous and infamous or unknown) about how they deal with a serious illness or a near-fatal accident. 

Their writings are a goldmine; they touch the heart and pierce the soul:

The patient has to start treating illness not as a disaster, an occasion for depression or panic, but as a narrative, a story.  Stories are antibodies against illness and pain. — Anatole Broyard

After the surgery I wrote a story… when I tell this story I always end it with “And so that you know my story is true, I have the scar to prove it.” And then I point to the scar on my neck.  I love my scar.  Scars are tangible proof that we have healed. — Laura, writing workshop participant

I am drawn to this book because I had a boss, Ms. G., who had breast cancer. Her right breast was removed in 2001; the cancer went into remission, but in 2006 the big C came back with a vengeance, like a huge wind toppling a small boat.  The book gave me ideas about the trials and struggles of cancer patients:  the tests, treatments, chemotherapy, lumpectomy, mastectomy, etc. 

Pre-cancer, Ms. G. pounced like a tigress, drilling me about the company’s cash position, budgets and financial forecasts (I am a finance person).  I racked my brain for answers, for magic numbers I had memorized before meeting with her.  There were a lot of sleepless nights I spent doing and analyzing financial models, projections, and reports to present to her. 

Ms. G. was my mentor.  She was the Dumbledore to my Harry Potter, the Gandalf to my Frodo Baggins.  Then, the cancer recurred. She began her chemo and lost a lot of weight.  When her hair started to fall, she wore scarves around her thinning hair.  When she lost all her hair, she wore wigs. 

In her book, Abercrombie’s left hand swelled into “pincushion without the pins” proportions during therapy.  During chemo, the veins in Ms. G.’s left hand turned blue black, like spider webs in henna.  I would flinch inwardly when I’d accidentally gaze at her afflicted hand during our finance meetings. But she never discussed her ailment; it was always business as usual.  The more I read the book, the more convinced I was that my boss should read it.  The book was a great source of inspiration. The author journeyed the difficult path that Ms. G. was taking at the time. It could give her comfort to know that she was not alone.  Reading the book could help alleviate her pain — physical and emotional, all she had to do was to write out her storm, write out her story. 

I bought another copy and gave it to her.

The last time I saw her, she was being ushered gingerly by her driver and executive assistant towards her car. She seemed no longer standing in the center of time.  She was on time’s edge.  Ms. G., my boss, my friend, my personal Dumbledore, had shed somehow the laughter and vibrancy that had followed her through the world, and had assumed the quiet dignity and strangeness of a wanderer about to depart forever.

I didn’t say goodbye. Her body might have been frail, but her mind was still as sharp as a scythe and her spirit was a lion of courage.

Ms. G. succumbed to cancer in December 2007.  Three days before she died, I was promoted head of our department.

I will never forget the white flowers, mounds and heaps of them around the chapel.  There was a plethora of white flowers lining the altar-like wrought iron table with Ms. G.’s urn and her black and white picture in a pensive mood.  It was my first time to attend a memorial service of a cremated person. Not seeing a body, I thought that the impact was less painful, but I quietly wept before her ashes, in the same way I cried before my mother’s casket when I was 11, and at my father’s funeral years later.

In the book, Abercrombie encourages her workshop participants to write their stories. She talks about writing their stories scene by scene, as if looking through small windows or making squares of a quilt without the need to go from the beginning to the now. 

Ms. G. might not have written out her storm, which is why I am writing this for her — a tiny window in her cathedral of life, a small patch in her quilt of worthy existence.  This is my homage, my proper goodbye to her somewhere up there in her Mansions Above.

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This week’s winner: Nanette N. Tabuac is a CPA and currently head of the accounting department of an exclusive school for girls in Quezon City. She finished her MBA from DLSU Manila.  She can’t cook, can’t drive and can’t dance.  She’s a Harry Potter girl through and through, and loves reading books and writing poetry. Her favorite authors include Marian Keyes, JK Rowling, Russell Baker, Susan Orleans, and Sophie Kinsella.