PTSD


 * __​ ​ ​ What is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder? __**



Definition: Post traumatic stress disorder is an emotional and psychological disorder that results from a tragic experience during someone's life. It is very common for soldiers, those who witness war, rape victims, victims of kidnapping, those involved in vehicle crashes, and anyone who experiences a devastating catastrophe may suffer from PTSD. ​__** History Of PTSD **__ While PTSD has likely been around for centuries, only as recently as 1980 has the American Psychiatric Association officially added PTSD to its Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders. Because people have been experiencing extremely stressful, potentially life-threatening events for centuries, clearly PTSD is a condition that has plagued humans for quite some time before it was officially recognized as an emotional disorder. In fact, throughout our history, PTSD has been called a number of other different names, including: · //battle fatigue // or //gross stress reaction// for soldiers who came down with PTSD after World War II  ·  //combat fatigue // or //shell shock// for soldiers who experienced PTSD symptoms after World War I  ·  //soldier's heart // for soldiers who developed the symptoms of PTSD after the Civil War. Unfortunately, before the medical community recognized PTSD as a viable emotional disorder, most leaders and doctors thought it was simply nothing more than cowardice or personal weakness. Although PTSD was largely disregarded for decades, the Vietnam War brought significant public attention to this emotional disorder when doctors began to diagnose it as post-Vietnam syndrome. The Vietnam veterans who suffered from this disorder pushed the medical and the military community to recognize it as a legitimate disorder.  __**Symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder**__

The effects of PTSD include extreme fear, depression, and anxiety. PTSD can happen in various ways. With this being said, PTSD can last for a short period of time i.e. 6 months, or the disorder can eventually become cronic and can last for years. Although PTSD can be hard to understand, there are 3 basic stages of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. The three categories are Intrusion, avoidance, and hyperarousal symptoms.
 * **//Intrusion symptoms://** When memories of the past event take over current life, and arrive suddenly, these are the signs of intrusion symptoms. The most common intrusion symptom is the flashback. Sights,sounds, or smells can trigger vivid memories which create flashbacks. Reliving the traumatic experience over and over again can be very real and can be filled with emotion. With flashbacks as one symptom, the nightmare is yet another symptom of intrusion. Nightmare occurances can happen out of the blue and unexpectedly, which causes extreme anxiety and fear.
 * **//Avoidance symptoms://** Avoidance symptoms is when the victim of PTSD attempts to prevent remembering anything to do with the traumatic event. The person may feel a sense of numbness throughout their body. One may avoid specific reminders of the traumatic event in order to escape flashbacks. Depression, alternate feelings of intense emotion and simply no emotion at all can occur.
 * **//Hyperarousal symptoms://** The last category of PTSD are the Hyperarousal sypmtoms. This involves stimuated nerves and hormones of the body. Insomnia and trouble remembering the entire traumatic event, and difficulty concentrating can come into play with Hyperarousal symptoms. Irritability and sudden outburts of emotion for no real reason can be other signs of Hyperarousal PTSD. As far as physical symptoms go, stomach problems, headaches, chestpain, and dizziness are all experienced with victims of PTSD.

__Treatments for PTSD__ When dealing with PTSD, victims have many different options as far as treatments go to overcome this disorder.
 * **Trauma-focused cognitive-behavioral therapy.** Cognitive-behavioral therapy for PTSD and trauma involves carefully and gradually discussing one's thoughts, feelings, and situations that trigger memories from the traumatic experience. Therapy also involves identifying upsetting thoughts about the traumatic event–particularly thoughts that are distorted and irrational—and replacing them with more balanced picture.
 * **EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)** – EMDR incorporates elements of cognitive-behavioral therapy with eye movements or other forms of rhythmic, left-right stimulation, such as hand taps or sounds. Eye movements and other bilateral forms of stimulation are thought to work by “unfreezing” the brain’s information processing system, which is interrupted in times of extreme stress, leaving only frozen emotional fragments which retain their original intensity. Once EMDR frees these fragments of the trauma, they can be integrated into a cohesive memory and processed.
 * **Family therapy.** Since PTSD affects both you and those close to you, family therapy can be especially productive. Family therapy can help your loved ones understand what you’re going through. It can also help everyone in the family communicate better and work through relationship problems.
 * **Medication.** Medication is sometimes prescribed to people with PTSD to relieve secondary symptoms of depression or anxiety, but it does not treat the causes of PTSD.

​ __Types of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder__ There are 4 types of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Acute Stress Disorder: Symptoms occur within 4 weeks of the traumatic event and last for more than 2 days, but less than 4 weeks. Acute Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: When Symptoms last for more than four weeks. Delayed Onset Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: May not appear until **YEARS** after the initial traumatic event. Chronic Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: When symptoms last for more than 90 days. Symptoms may lapse for a number of days or weeks in a row, but symptoms will **__ALWAYS RETURN__**. __ Examples of Ishmael Beah's PTSD __
 * __Chapter 2 Page 19__ - "A shudder racked my body, and I tried to think about my new life in New York City, where I had been for over a month. But my mind wandered across the AtlanticOcean back to Sierra Leone."
 * __Chapter 2 Page 19__ - "I was afraid to fall asleep, but staying awake also brought back painful memories."
 * __Chapter 12 Page 103__ - Has a dream of being shot and about to be eaten by a dog. "I woke up before it started what I was afraid it was going to do to me. I was sweating and couldn't sleep for the rest of the night."
 * __Chapter 13 Page 120__ - "He placed his gun on my forehead. I immeadiately woke up from my dream and began shooting inside the tent, until the thirty rounds in the magazine were finished."
 * __Chapter 16 Page 145__ - "But we were still traumatized, and now that we had time to think, the fastened mantle of our war memories slowly began to open."
 * __Chapter 16 Page 145__ - "Whenever i turned on the tap water, all i could see was blood gushing out. I would stare at it until it looked like water before drinking or taking a shower."
 * __Chapter 16 Page 145__ - "Othertimes, the younger boys sat by rocks weeping and telling us that the rocks were their dead families."[[image:http://static.howstuffworks.com/gif/ptsd-16a.jpg width="275" height="281" align="right"]]
 * __Chapter 17 Page160__ - "I tried to think about my childhood days, but it was impossible, as I began getting flashbacks of the first time I slit a man's throat."
 * After arriving at the rehabilitation camps, they boys started having withdrawals from not having access to their drugs. These withdrawals led to obscure behavior and violence until they were past their withdrawals. The children at these camps then started to experience PTSD much more than ever before because they could focus on their memories and what they had experienced throughout the war. Knightmares became common in Ishmael and the other boys as well. Their memories haunted them both day and night and they could not escape their past.

<span style="font-family: Impact,Charcoal,sans-serif; font-size: 160%;">__Relation to Maslow's Pyramid__ Sufferers of PTSD cannot pass a certain level of Maslow's Pyramid. Their PTSD has been caused by a very traumatic experience. Most of the time, the sitution they were in was extremely unsafe. Although their physiological needs are being met, it is very difficult for sufferers of this disorder to ever feel completely safe. They can be defensive and paranoid about everything. This makes it impossible for them to move higher on the pyramid.