Toronto Area: Sharon’s next “Writing Through Cancer” series begins in May, 2019 at Gilda’s Club of Greater Toronto. Wednesdays, 2 p.m. – 4 p.m. 8 weeks. Registration is required.
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Sharon is a masterful teacher and guide.. she creates a space of safety, creativity, and healing…Those who write with Sharon begin to make positive meaning out of the difficult journey of cancer, and they also have the opportunity to discover and share a new voice–a voice of strength and story that will be honored in its sharing… It has been such a gift for me to participate in this life-changing group…
Quite simply, it has changed my life.
–Former participants, Sharon’s expressive writing groups
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Participants tell me how much they love the program…It’s not just a support group; she has a real curriculum. It requires a high degree of sensitivity and professionalism.
Tom Friedman, LCSW, Scripps Cancer Center
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She has a vast knowledge of the field and is able to tailor workshops to the participants’ and program needs…a professional in the best sense – she is a great communicator, self-sufficient and well-prepared…Dr. Bray is an amazing person – compassionate, funny, dedicated and brilliant. She changes people’s lives.
Audrey Shafer, MD, Director, Medicine and the Muse Program, Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics
About Sharon Bray:
Inspired by her cancer experience and the research of Dr. James Pennebaker and his colleagues, Sharon Bray initiated and led her first writing group for breast cancer survivors in early 2001 until at Bay Area Cancer Connections (formerly Community Breast Health Project) in Palo Alto, CA. That experience inspired her first book, A Healing Journey: Writing Together Through Cancer, published in 2004. Since then, she has designed and led writing programs for cancer survivors at several nonprofit and healthcare organizations in Northern and Southern California, including Bay Area Breast Cancer Association, Stanford Cancer Center, Scripps Green Cancer Center and UCSD Moores Cancer Center (La Jolla, CA). She was also the leader for the “Writers’ Workshop at Stanford Medical School,” for twelve years,(2005 – 2017), a writing workshop for faculty, students, staff and alumni, and an instructor in creative nonfiction for UCLA extension Writers’ Program (2007 – 2017) Her second book, When Words Heal: Writing Through Cancer, published in 2006, was intended as a guide for the prospective group leader of an expressive writing group for people living with cancer. She recently returned with her husband to Toronto, Canada. She now leads a series of “Writing Through Cancer Workshops” for Gilda’s Club of Greater Toronto.
The “Writing Through Cancer” blog began in 2006, as Sharon moved from Silicon Valley to San Diego, and she has continued it on a weekly basis ever since. Initially aimed at supporting her Stanford writing group between her trips to Stanford each month, it grew to a site available to anyone living with cancer or other debilitating illness or life trauma. Her weekly posts continue on a bi-weekly basis. Sharon also authors a bi-monthly column “Writing for Wellness” for the Canadian publication, Cancer Knowledge Resource Network and continues her expressive writing workshops for cancer patients and survivors at Gilda’s Club of Greater Toronto and recently launched a new blog, “www.heartmusings.ca,” personal reflections on living with heart failure.
Sharon earned her doctoral degree in Applied Psychology from the University of Toronto in 1987 and studied transformative language arts and creative writing through Goddard College, Humber College and University of Washington.
