Understanding PTSD: Processing and Rewiring the Traumatized Brain
For many, Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome (PTSD) seems like a scary and insurmountable diagnosis. However, it is more common than one might think. Nationally, roughly 1 in 11 people will receive a PTSD diagnosis within their lifetime. PTSD does not discriminate - impacting individuals across various ethnicities, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, gender, or age. Specific populations are more likely to experience PTSD. For example, in the U.S., women are two times more likely to experience PTSD than men. Latinos, African Americans, and American Indians have higher rates of PTSD compared to non-Latino whites. With so many people being impacted by trauma, you may wonder, could I have PTSD?
First, let's understand what PTSD is. It is defined as a mental disorder where the individual has experienced or witnessed a traumatic or stressful event. To break it down further - a traumatic response is when one's nervous system becomes overwhelmed by unwanted or threatening external stimuli out of their control. The body goes into a fight, flight, or freeze response - which overrides our conscious awareness and allows our survival brain to take over. The survival system in the brain attempts to rebalance the body by regulating the nervous system. When the brain redirects energy for survival, it shuts down the ability to feel pain and the ability to encode memory, which is why details and memory of the event are often lost. Trauma occurs when the person does not "let go," and the traumatic experience remains trapped in the body in somatic energy. This blockage can cause emotional, physical, and mental distress. Watch this short video Trauma and the Brain for more information on how the brain reacts to trauma.
There are different types of trauma ranging from natural disasters, to physical, emotional, or sexual abuse from an intimate partner, to the loss of a physical ability or loved one. PTSD is not just for war veterans. You can experience medical trauma, relationship trauma, and birth trauma, just to name a few. These types of events can be experienced as a single episode or repeated directly or indirectly through a narration of the event, also known as secondary or vicarious trauma. PTSD can occur at any age after the first year of life, with symptoms usually occurring within three months after the event or with a delayed expression that could show up years later.
Common symptoms of PTSD include but are not limited to:
intrusive thoughts or memories
flashbacks
sleep disturbances
emotional distress or numbness
irritability
avoidance of stimuli related to the events
exaggerated startle response
hypervigilance
inability to recall details of the event
self-destructive behavior
social withdrawal
difficulty maintaining relationships
hopelessness.
The good news is there are effective therapeutic treatments for PTSD! Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Therapy, Prolonged Exposure (PE) Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Mindfulness, and Grounding Techniques are commonly used to treat trauma. Most importantly, you will want to find a caring and compassionate therapist that you feel comfortable sharing your traumatic experiences with in session. Individuals seeking treatment for trauma may want to specifically request a one-time consultation, to best assess if a particular therapist is right for them.
After receiving a diagnosis of PTSD, it's essential to understand that there is great hope for healing. The first step in healing from your trauma is making the decision to begin processing your experiences in therapy. PTSD recovery can be a slow but incredibly worthwhile undertaking. As mentioned earlier, our brains react to stressful events for survival, and in doing so, the traumatic events are often not fully processed by the brain. But the good news is that our brains can heal via neuroplasticity, meaning your brains can form new neural pathways to integrate and process the traumatic events. Dr. Daniel Siegel, clinical professor of psychiatry at UCLA School of Medicine and author of Mindsight: The New Science of Personal Transformation (2010), states that "neurons that fire together wire together." What does that mean exactly? Those dysfunctional neural pathways created by the traumatic event can be processed, integrated, and corrected to form new, more functional neural pathways that allow for healing in therapy. There is hope!
American Psychiatric Association: What is PTSD?
Mayo Clinic: An Overview of PTSD