Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder “PTSD”

Traumatic exposure occurs in two ways.

1-The person may experience the trauma as being a victim to it. In this type of the trauma the person is himself directly the part of a traumatic event. For instance, a person is facing PTSD due to his own car accident or death of a loved one.

2- Second type of PTSD can be developed in a person just by witnessing a shocking incident, learning about trauma through the third person who had been victimized to trauma. For example, indirect exposure which usually happens during professional duties such as police dealing with an accident or fire responders, investigations or a doctor confronts the death of the patient. They all may develop PTSD due to learning about traumatic event that they are not directly a part of. However indirect exposure effects in rare cases when some emotional or personal attachments or emotions exist already.

PTSD can be a result of various traumatic causes. The traumatic causes can be any shocking and distressing incident some of them are mentioned below:

• Death of loved once
• Departure of loved once away
• Severe accident
• Murder
• Natural calamity
• Rape
• Physical or psychological Abuse.

Although the reasons behind the development of PTSD may vary from person to person but there are some general symptoms that are common in any PTSD’s patient. Some of those general symptoms are mentioned as follow:

• The symptoms can appear in the form of social, personal behavioral and cognitional dysfunction in a person’s life.
• The person may demonstrate destructive behavior, aggression, irritability, lack of focus, difficulty in sleep, vulnerability to risk, disinterest in activities, insomnia, memory loss, isolated behavior, negative thought pattern for itself or others.
• The person may feel difficulty to experience and persevere positivity in thoughts and behaviors.
• A person may feel detached to own self or may feel the world or things happening around them unreal if the symptoms get worsen.
• The person may feel like they are back to traumatic event when they see something related.
• The person may completely avoid things, places or people that were part of the traumatic event.
• The person may panic on exposure to anything that reminds him of the traumatic event.

Now let’s move towards the treatment, when it comes to treatment you need to understand that the person suffering from PTSD does not need to cope up with their psychological disturbance all alone. There are many ways out that are available through which you can seek the right help.

• Psycho -Therapy

Psychological therapies are one of the most effective treatments to come out of lasting fear of your traumatic event. In which the therapist helps you to develop stress managing skills, so you can handle your traumatic stress in a right and a better way that it does not impair your daily life functioning. It may help you to gain your control over recurring unwanted memories, flashbacks, nightmares and other negative effects of shock. The therapies that are helpful in this case are talk therapy, exposure therapy, cognitive therapy, and desensitization. These therapeutic interventions will help you in changing the pattern of your reactions toward the triggers of experienced traumatic event.

• Medication

Medication is one of the most effective methods of treatment in the case of PTSD. In medication, you need to explain the clear and whole symptoms and signs of your illness. After examining your situation carefully, the clinician will prescribe the right medicine with a suitable dosage and duration to you. The effects of medication will start to show up within a week and patient is likely to start expressing the balance and stability in their mood and emotional regulations during the medications. The medications that help in PTSD can be Prazosin which reduces the nightmare effects, some anti-anxiety medications, or anti-depressants can also prove to be effective.