Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: Its Symptoms And How To Overcome It

When we talk about emotional trauma, we automatically tend to think of terrible experiences lived in childhood, however, not all traumas are generated in our first years of life. People without significant childhood trauma can also be deeply marked by very serious events that occurred in their adult life. This is what happens, for example, to people with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder).

This is what happened to one of my patients, Paula. She had a happy childhood, without great problems, she grew up surrounded by a family that loved and cared for her. But, at the age of 28, his life fell apart. On the way to work, he suffered a traffic accident that not only nearly cost him his life, but also left permanent sequelae on his legs.

When she came for consultation, 10 years after the accident, Paula was still waking up with nightmares in the middle of the night. As he told me, he could not stop remembering and reliving, on a daily basis, that fateful moment that changed his life.

Relive the traumatic moment without stopping

PTSD is generated when the person undergoes a strong stress reaction after experiencing a particularly intense and unpleasant event, such as a violent robbery, rape, accident, negative birth experience, kidnapping, etc.

After an experience of this type, it is normal to feel high levels of stress.

When the person cannot process what happened and, after a few weeks or months, continues to present these same high levels of anxiety, PTSD can be diagnosed.

The person suffering from PTSD lives in a continuous state of anxiety and alertness. At any moment you can recall your trauma and experience it (physically and emotionally) again and with special intensity, as if you are really living it again.

A classic example can be found in war veterans. Some of them are very susceptible to noises such as blows, firecrackers or rockets, since they automatically take them back to the terrible experience lived long ago.

Blockages related to the stressful experience

It is common for people with PTSD to avoid situations related to their trauma. Paula, for example, had not driven since her accident. After much effort, she had managed to get in as a passenger in a car, but only if it was driven by her sister, the only driver with whom she felt safe.

Despite this confidence, every time he had to drive a car generated great anxiety and he avoided it whenever he could. As you can understand, this restriction caused him great difficulties in his day-to-day life.

Fulfilling another of the usual characteristics of PTSD, Paula felt that she had been blocked in the experience of her accident. He could not advance in his personal projects.

He told me that he felt that his life had stopped that day, over and over again, he relived it in a loop.

One idea that tormented her and that she could not silence was that “she had destroyed her life because of a failure of a tenth of a second . ” He would obsessively review the night of the accident and fantasize about how everything would have changed if he had done this or that action differently. When she had a “bad day”, as she said, she lost the will to live and had even come to think of suicide.

How to Overcome Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

The treatment of PTSD is complex and usually requires, initially, the combination of psychotherapy with medication to calm the high levels of anxiety that the person experiences. Because the trauma originated in a very intense emotional state, to achieve healing both physically and emotionally, it is necessary to use, over a long period of time, a combination of different therapeutic techniques.

In addition, the damage is so deep that a small remnant of anxiety may remain after the treatment for certain especially stressful situations for the person. In these cases, you can always work so that this anxiety does not affect the performance of daily life.

In Paula’s case, we worked for months to put her trauma in the right place. That is, as an experience from his past that had left him permanent physical consequences, but which was not an immovable obstacle that could block his present for life.

After a while, he managed to reduce his anxiety level and began to drive with other trusted family or friends.

Finally, as a personal challenge, he set out to drive again to regain his autonomy. Twelve years later, on the anniversary of his accident, he managed to drive his car for a ride and reach a shopping center near his home.