Our Weekly Tip: One Last Letter to Your Loved Ones

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Our Tip of the Week: Psychologists and psychotherapists often tell their clients to express their emotions in writing, specifically in letter form. This has proven to be an effective method for resolving interpersonal problems. Often, simply expressing everything you feel honestly in writing helps process your thoughts and emotions. You don’t even have to send the letter to get the benefits; storing it away in a desk drawer for a week is just as, if not more, effective than sending the letter off to the intended recipient. You can use the same process when you’re going through the loss of a loved one. The sending of the letter isn’t the important part; it’s all about the stream of consciousness writing it promotes.

How-to Suggestion: Use an old-fashioned pen and paper for this process. This has two essential benefits that you won’t get from writing your letter on a computer or in pencil. First, real ink is permanent, making it far more difficult to edit your thoughts. Your goal isn’t to write a beautiful piece of poetry to share with the world, but simply to get all of your feelings out of your head and onto the page. Don’t erase anything and don’t scratch anything out. If the grammar is terrible, don’t stress over it. You are writing the letter for yourself, not for someone else to read.  Secondly, it takes more effort to painstakingly hand-write every word in your letter than it does to quickly type something out on a keyboard.

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Once you’ve gathered your materials, let the words flow out of you naturally. Don’t worry about the order or the organization. Feel free to revisit anything that pops into your head in the moment. Address your letter to your dead loved one, telling them everything you wanted to say before they died. Talk to them about how you feel now that they are gone.

Finally, when you’ve said all that you can think of saying, fold the letter up neatly and tuck it away somewhere safe. Leave the letter there for at least a week or even a few months. When you feel ready, you can go back and read it. Some people who are grieving also find it liberating to tear the letter up and throw it away. The real benefit is not in the letter itself, but in the act of writing it.