The Honors Project: PTSD awareness

The PTSD AWARENESS

Hi, this is Teresa and today I'd like to review PTSD and the treatments for that. NOT ONLY war and combats are serious traumas. We all have so many chances to have PTSD unfortunately, as long as were living in this modern society. Experiencing crime as a victim, natural disaster, car or air crash, and even witnessing these horrific events can be serious traumas of us.

Not all the people who experienced traumatic events would suffer from PTSD, but its natural to have this after those things happened.

What are the symptoms of PTSD?

PTSD stands for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and a trauma is a witnessed or experienced event that the person perceives as physically and/or psychologically life threatening.

I know there is C-PTSD ( Complexed PTSD) which is really severe, but in this project, Im mainly talking about traditional PTSD.

Symptoms are like....

・Reliving the event e.g. flashbacks, nightmares

・Avoiding reminders of the event e.g. numbing, sense of limited future, loss of interest in activities, isolation

・Hyperarousal e.g angry outbursts, feeling jumpy, Aggressive behavior

・Negative thought and mood changes e.g. guilt, shame, self-blame, difficulty concentrating or remembering things , depression

Some of us think that flashback is the main symptom of PTSD, but its not the only one. Actually it is said Avoidance is the one which can maintains symptoms in the long-term. Avoidance can make us disconnected from people, isolated in the society and can cause serious problems. We may also feel like our character has been changed since that shocking event happened, and that means were suffering from hyper arousal

Why do Post Traumatic Stress Disorders develop?

It is said that our hippocampus damage caused by trauma is one of the main reason to have PTSD symptoms, and its true that PTSD can happen to anyone.

There are high-risk factors to have those after traumatic events happened.

Youre more likely to develop PTSD

・If you are female. It is said that female hormone is related to PTSD.

・If you were directly exposed to the traumatic event or were hurt/injured seriously during that event,

・If you had very little emotional support or understanding of others around you,

・If you had other traumatic experience in your past.

PTSD can happen to ANYONE.

Is there a treatment for PTSD?

Yes, there is. There are many evidence based treatments for PTSD.

Psychotherapies ( Trauma-Focused Psychotherapy )

・Prolonged Exposure

・Cognitive Processing Therapy

・Eye Movement Desensitization and reprocessing

Medications

・SSRIs and SNRIs

It is said that benzodiazepines are not really effective for the symptoms of PTSD.

Only trained professionals can provide those Psychotherapies so its not always really helpful for the survivors to talk about traumatic experience in detail, especially when they don t want to. Of course its good to talk to someone who would listen to survivors and get quick emotional relief, if a survivor wants to. Its totally up to survivors.

But when it comes to therapy, we need some time to construct trust between therapists and us to talk about traumatic events. You can choose your therapist and of course its okay to change your therapist. Just remember, not to stop therapy abruptly for your own safety and emotional health.

Its okay to take your time to get into therapy.

Of course its good to have PE therapy and other psychotherapies for PTSD treatment since they are evidence based, but its totally okay to take our own time. No one needs to be forced to have a therapy, as long as he/ she is not hurting someone severely.

If you are a close friend or family member of the crime survivors, what can you do for them?

Just listening is a great help for the survivors. Please dont be judgmental, or accuse survivors to experience traumatic events.

Just being there with them is really helpful. You can also let them know the existence of the hotlines and some other helpful websites while theyre in crisis and dont have energy left to find them out.

Take care of yourself first. Of course its nice and kind of you to help survivors, but youre not the only one person to help them. Its okay to tell them youd like to have some time for yourself, your own pleasure.

Forgiveness? my message to the peer survivors suffering from PTSD

From my perspective, I dont think forgiving abusers are not really necessary for the healing from the severe traumas. The person we need to forgive is ourselves, and it is also true that It is toughest to forgive ourselves.

You can forgive your abusers if youd like to, or if forgiveness happened automatically, but I really would like to stress that ‘Its not necessary.

Our goal to achieve is to heal ourselves and think less about traumatic experience, and make that experience less influential in our daily, ordinary lives.

Maybe its not very good thing to say, but our first priority is our safety and our own happy lives. You dont need to forgive abusers or perpetrators for your healing. Im saying this, just because I spent most of my teen to struggle with forgiveness forced by people who were close to me. I dont want anyone to suffer from the fact that he/she cant forgive the ones who did horrible things to him/her.

Its OKAY. You got hurt and youve survived. Youve been doing much more than enough already. You dont need to be forced to forgive perpetrators.

I really do hope that all survivors would find some comfort out of their lives, and not only survive, but thrive in their future.

Sources of Information: https://www.ptsd.va.gov/apps/decisionaid/

https://www.helpguide.org/articles/ptsd-trauma/ptsd-symptoms-self-help-treatment.htm

https://www.rainn.org

Story of a survivor who experienced sexual assault ( trigger warning! ) ️ : http://thisisptsd.com/ptsd-symptoms-since-assaulted/

Book Recommendation: The Courage to heal Laura Davis, Ellen Bass

Watch these videos: https://youtu.be/YMC2jt_QVEE

https://youtu.be/FeLLt39DI8A

#honorsproject @RaCat