The journey towards active self‐care and empowerment: Insights from a thematic analysis of a women's therapeutic expressive writing group (UK)

Abstract

Therapeutic writing can be conceptualised as writing in a structured or unstructured manner, which can be guided or self-initiated, and facilitates the expression, exploration and reflections upon emotions and thoughts relating to an objective experience (Wright & Chung, 2001). Sometimes referred to as "expressive writing," its overall focus is to improve mental or physical well-being, with a growing recognition of the value in writing for therapeutic purposes as a credible therapeutic intervention (Nicholson, 2018). A seminal study by Pennebaker and Beall (1986) created the expressive writing paradigm and published the starting point of experimental