Dr Eddie Murphy Coping with PTSD
This month, people around the world have been remembering the millions who died in WWI, but we should also be mindful of people living with the psychological effects of PTSD
When I was a nurse in the UK in the 1980s, some of the patients in my care were men who had survived WW1 and later in the 1990s, I worked with men who had survived traumatic experiences in WWII. Nobody spoke about trauma or PTSD then, and yet when I reflect now, so many of these men still had active symptoms of PTSD decades later. I also worked in a specialist traumatic stress service in London and I have always had a particular interest in this area.
However, you don’t have to experience war to have PTSD. Many of us will experience trauma at some point in our lives – an experience which is overwhelming, threatening, scary or out of our control. With time, most people get over their experiences without professional help. However, for a significant proportion of people, the effects of trauma can last for much longer and can become post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Common traumas
These include:
* Being in an accident, such as a road traffic accident.
* Being the victim of violence, such as being physically or sexually assaulted.
* Being in a life-threatening situation, such as a natural disaster or a health emergency.
* Witnessing violence towards another person, or witnessing death.
Some traumas are isolated; ‘one off ’ events, while other traumas might be expected and anticipated. Some people’s jobs make them more likely to experience or witness trauma, such as gardaí or emergency service personnel. Children can experience trauma at the hands of people who are supposed to be their caregivers. Events which are more likely to lead to PTSD are more severe, inter-personal or deliberate, are inescapable or are repeated. Trauma that happens earlier in life may lead to more complex outcomes.
Symptoms of PTSD are split into four groups:
1 Re-experiencing symptoms: Memories of the trauma play over and over in your mind. These memories can come back as ‘flashbacks’ during the day or as nightmares at night. The memories can be re-experienced as images of what happened, but also as sounds, smells, tastes or physical sensations associated with the trauma.
2 Arousal symptoms: It is common to be ‘on edge’ or ‘on guard’ following a trauma. Many people find it difficult to relax and find that their sleep is affected.
3 Avoidance symptoms: A normal way of dealing with physical or emotional pain is to avoid it or distract ourselves from it. People with PTSD often try to avoid any people, places or other reminders of their trauma. Some people try very hard to distract themselves to avoid thinking about the trauma.
4 Negative thoughts and moods: Trauma can have a powerful effect on how we think. Some people blame themselves for what happened, regardless of whether it’s their fault or not. Others might replay parts of the trauma and think ‘What if …?’ or ‘If only…’ People with PTSD may also experience depression.
What keeps PTSD going?
In PTSD, memories of traumatic events keep coming back to haunt us because they are ‘unprocessed.’ The event was so overwhelming that the brain was unable to store the memories properly at the time. They keep reappearing in the form of flashbacks or nightmares because they haven’t been dealt with in the normal way in our long-term memory. Constantly re-experiencing memories of the trauma keeps us feeling unsafe. Unfortunately, in PTSD, this can mean that the unprocessed memories stay ‘stuck’. Trying too hard to avoid parts of life can mean that we live a restricted existence which can have a dramatic effect on how we feel.
Treatments for PTSD
Stage 1: Stabilisation – This stage can include learning about PTSD and learning grounding techniques to cope with the symptoms.
Stage 2: Making sense of what happened to you. This can involve talking about what happened and understanding how the events affected you.
Stage 3: Reclaiming your life. PTSD often makes us live a shadow of our former lives. Once the major symptoms of PTSD are resolved, we need to claim back the lives that we want to lead.
If you have experienced trauma, address it early so you too can reclaim back your life.