What is Trauma and PTSD?
PTSD is a difficult disorder that often has at least temporarily debilitating effects on those who experience these symptoms. Anyone who has been involved in a near death experience, from war, criminal behavior, a vehicle accident, or natural disaster, or witnessing of a near death experience can be left with overwhelming fear, or terror, that can lead them to severe difficulties in daily functioning. Intrusive frightening thoughts and memories, severe emotional numbness, emotional blanking out, or complete avoidance of events that remind them of the trauma, can cause people who have PTSD to have severely disrupted lives. People can experience PTSD with symptoms ranging from mild to severe.
PTSD symptoms may start in childhood, due to severe physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. Even extreme medical treatments can cause children to experience traumatic symptoms. In childhood or adulthood, living through a natural disaster, war, a vehicle accident, seeing a violent crime or being a victim of a violent crime, or living in any environment where ones safety is constantly at risk, can trigger these symptoms.
Symptoms including depression, anxiety, lethargy, irritability, poor memory or concentration, difficulty sleeping, nightmares, poor social attachments, high sensitivity to stress, numbness to many parts of one’s life, dissociation, feelings of frequently reliving the event, extreme avoidance in certain areas of one’s life, are some of the symptoms associated with PTSD. Also, you may always feel on guard, or have an easily triggered startle response, somatic complaints (physical problems with no diagnostic cause), or you may feel shame or despair or hoplessness.
There are 4 general types of symptoms:
1. Reliving the event
2. Avoiding situations that remind you of the event
3. Feeling numb
4. Feeling keyed up (hyperalterness)
The good news is that most people with PTSD can recover quite well after receiving specialized PTSD psychotherapy and psychiatric/medication treatment.
The type of psychotherapy you receive is crucial to your recovery. One type of therapy does not fit all people. The type of trauma/traumas that you have experienced in part will determine the type of therapy /therapies that will be most effective for you. If childhood issues are involved, psychodynamic therapy may help your healing. For dealing with present symptoms that interfere with daily living, cognitive or cognitive behavioral therapy may best assist you. If certain behaviors are you causing you significant problems, pure behavioral therapy may best suit you.
Finding a therapist with a specialization in the field of PTSD can significantly shorten the time of your recovery. Most patients, when beginning therapy , are not aware that there is a major difference in the kind of training received by PTSD therapists, versus other specialities. It often is important for you also to be treated by a psychiatrist who also has a specialty in PTSD, as medications can help manage the severity of symptoms. If you have tried therapy before and it has not helped, it is important not to despair. Finding a therapist with expert training and experience will show you that recovery is possible.
The lastest neuroscience research has shown that therapies like EMDR, Ericksonian Hypnotherapy, Arts and Equestrian Therapy, Meditation, and Yoga can in various combinations can create much deeper and lasting healing.
If you have thoughts of suicide or harming yourself or others, immediately call your local emergency number (such as 911) or go to the hospital emergency room.
You may also call a suicide hotline from anywhere in the United States, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week: 1-800-SUICIDE or 1-800-999-9999.
Please contact Barbara Reade, LCPC for more information---
PTSD is a difficult disorder that often has at least temporarily debilitating effects on those who experience these symptoms. Anyone who has been involved in a near death experience, from war, criminal behavior, a vehicle accident, or natural disaster, or witnessing of a near death experience can be left with overwhelming fear, or terror, that can lead them to severe difficulties in daily functioning. Intrusive frightening thoughts and memories, severe emotional numbness, emotional blanking out, or complete avoidance of events that remind them of the trauma, can cause people who have PTSD to have severely disrupted lives. People can experience PTSD with symptoms ranging from mild to severe.
PTSD symptoms may start in childhood, due to severe physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. Even extreme medical treatments can cause children to experience traumatic symptoms. In childhood or adulthood, living through a natural disaster, war, a vehicle accident, seeing a violent crime or being a victim of a violent crime, or living in any environment where ones safety is constantly at risk, can trigger these symptoms.
Symptoms including depression, anxiety, lethargy, irritability, poor memory or concentration, difficulty sleeping, nightmares, poor social attachments, high sensitivity to stress, numbness to many parts of one’s life, dissociation, feelings of frequently reliving the event, extreme avoidance in certain areas of one’s life, are some of the symptoms associated with PTSD. Also, you may always feel on guard, or have an easily triggered startle response, somatic complaints (physical problems with no diagnostic cause), or you may feel shame or despair or hoplessness.
There are 4 general types of symptoms:
1. Reliving the event
2. Avoiding situations that remind you of the event
3. Feeling numb
4. Feeling keyed up (hyperalterness)
The good news is that most people with PTSD can recover quite well after receiving specialized PTSD psychotherapy and psychiatric/medication treatment.
The type of psychotherapy you receive is crucial to your recovery. One type of therapy does not fit all people. The type of trauma/traumas that you have experienced in part will determine the type of therapy /therapies that will be most effective for you. If childhood issues are involved, psychodynamic therapy may help your healing. For dealing with present symptoms that interfere with daily living, cognitive or cognitive behavioral therapy may best assist you. If certain behaviors are you causing you significant problems, pure behavioral therapy may best suit you.
Finding a therapist with a specialization in the field of PTSD can significantly shorten the time of your recovery. Most patients, when beginning therapy , are not aware that there is a major difference in the kind of training received by PTSD therapists, versus other specialities. It often is important for you also to be treated by a psychiatrist who also has a specialty in PTSD, as medications can help manage the severity of symptoms. If you have tried therapy before and it has not helped, it is important not to despair. Finding a therapist with expert training and experience will show you that recovery is possible.
The lastest neuroscience research has shown that therapies like EMDR, Ericksonian Hypnotherapy, Arts and Equestrian Therapy, Meditation, and Yoga can in various combinations can create much deeper and lasting healing.
If you have thoughts of suicide or harming yourself or others, immediately call your local emergency number (such as 911) or go to the hospital emergency room.
You may also call a suicide hotline from anywhere in the United States, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week: 1-800-SUICIDE or 1-800-999-9999.
Please contact Barbara Reade, LCPC for more information---