Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Shedding light on PTSD, how it affects people, and how to treat it by Emily Smith
What is PTSD? According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, also known as PTSD, occurs in some people who have experienced a traumatic event, such as military combat, assault, or some form of natural disaster. About 3.6% of the US adult population has been diagnosed with PTSD, and 37% of those are considered to have severe symptoms.
Treatment of PTSD While PTSD can be very difficult for people to deal with, there are ways for people to overcome, and there are ways to seek help. According to the US Department of Veterans Affairs, trauma-focused psychotherapies are the most highly recommended when combating PTSD. These treatments focus on the memory of the traumatic event or its meaning to help patients process the event. Some examples of traumafocused psychotherapies with the most promising results are Prolonged Exposure (PE) Therapy, Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). PE teaches patients to gain control by confronting their negative feelings by talking with a professional about their trauma and engaging in activities you haven’t done since the trauma. CPT teaches patients to reframe their thoughts regarding the trauma. EMDR helps patients process and make sense of their trauma by calling the trauma to mind while paying attention to a repetitive, back-and-forth movement or sound. There are multiple avenues people can take to receive this help. The Department of Veterans Affairs has resources for those seeking help. “All you have to do is contact your local Veterans Affairs support services which are located on most military installations,” says Sergeant Major Tanner, a JROTC instructor at Mountain View and retired U.S. Marine. Military OneSource is another resource for active duty or veteran soldiers seeking help. “This is the government/ military one stop resource for any issues, not just PTSD, for all active and veteran service members,” says Lieutenant Colonel Barnes, another Mountain View JROTC instructor and retired Marine.
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How PTSD affects people According to the National Institute of Mental Health, there are different categories of PTSD symptoms; re-experiencing symptoms, avoidance symptoms, arousal and reactivity symptoms, and cognition and mood symptoms. Re-experiencing symptoms include things like recurring, distressing thoughts or nightmares about the event. Avoidance symptoms include avoiding people, places, or thoughts that bring reminders of the event. Arousal and reactivity symptoms include being easily startled by certain stimuli, hypervigilance, and angry/ emotional outbursts. Cognition and mood symptoms include trouble remembering the traumatic event, distorted feelings regarding the event (such as unwarranted guilt/blame), and negative feelings about oneself. In order to be diagnosed with PTSD, they must experience at least one arousal symptom, at least one re-experiencing symptom, at least two arousal and reactivity, and at least two cognition and mood symptoms for over a month. The criteria is different for small children (less than 6 years old), as PTSD can manifest differently in children. For small children, things such as wetting the bed after having been potty trained, forgetting how or being unable to talk, acting out the scary event during playtime, and being unusually clingy with a parent/ guardian.
