How to add carriage returns??

Ok I have a general problem. I have a textarea on an html form. Well when the user get's to the end of the textarea, it wrap's around. The problem with this is that unless they do a carriage return, the text entered into the textarea is a very long line. So when ever they submit the form, the string in the textarea is just one long line without newlines or carriage returns. How do I add linefeeds every few words? Thanks, Brent