The process of writing about one's emotional wounds is generally called venting. One can also do this "therapy" for anger. It is widely accepted in the west that expressing our feelings is healing and restorative, while repressing them can be harmful to one's health.

Some therapies like Gestalt, Reichian, Primal Scream, emphasise the element of discharging affect, (taking the emotional "charge" out of the event.) Others focus on the better understanding of the event.

This "talking cure" can be traced back to Freud, although he considered the talking to be a way to find out the subconscious reasons for the maladies. The idea of catharsis (a purging or figurative cleansing of the emotions,k especially pity and fear or the release of emotional tention that restores or refreshes the spirit) can be traced back to Aristotle's definition of a tragedy as being a dramatic work with incidents arousing pity or fear.

Kennedy-Moore and Watson proposed a venting hypothesis which postulates that expressing emotions reduces the negative impact of the experience and phychological arousal, and assumes the bigger the expression, the greater the relief.

There is some debate about catharsis from an anthropological approach. (Malinowski, vs Levi-Strauss , Evans-Prichard)

The process of writing itself, can be cathardic and a release of emotional charge in some cases. Keeping a log can allow for more in depth study of the effects of how relevant the use of these techniques are in a given situation with certain individuals.

A common sense approach to this whole subject is to apply the pragmatic proof of truth, does it work for you?