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  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

    Post-Traumatic
    Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a trauma- and stress-related disorder that can develop after a person witnesses or experiences an extremely traumatic, tragic or terrifying event that involves death, serious injury, sexual violence, assault, accident, or disaster. PTSD is always related to an external event.

Trauma can be experienced directly or witnessed. It can also be experienced indirectly through hearing about a close friend or relative who has experienced the event directly. PTSD can result when individuals experience repeated or extreme indirect exposure to traumatic experiences. Common victims include soldiers, police officers, firefighters, Emergency Medical Service providers, and emergency room staff.

Most professionals with experience in treating PTSD recognize that people can experience PTSD-like reactions even though the events experienced do not technically meet criteria for a traumatic event as described above. People can experience PTSD-like reactions following such events as divorce, the loss of a loved one, infidelity, media exposure to traumatic events, and emotional abuse.

Symptoms of PTSD

In addition to having experienced or witnessed a traumatic event, people with PTSD will have suffered for a month or more with the following symptoms:

Re-experiencing or intrusions; intrusive memories or thoughts related to the event:

  • Nightmares related to the event
  • Flashbacks, having the compelling experience that the event is happening again
  • Psychological and physical reactivity triggered by reminders of the traumatic event, such as a person, place, situation, or anniversary

Avoidance:

  • People with PTSD will avoid people, situations, thoughts, feelings and memories related to the trauma.

Negative alterations in mood or cognition:

  • People with PTSD often have symptoms of depression and experience a variety of difficulties with feeling depressed and being stuck in certain patterns of thinking and feeling. Basically, there is a decline in mood or disruption of thinking and feeling, which can include:
    • Memory problems related exclusively to the event
    • Negative thoughts and beliefs about the self, other people and the future
    • A disoriented sense of guilt related to the event
    • Getting stuck in severe emotions related to the event (e.g., horror, shame, sadness)
    • Severely reduced interest in activities that were part of normal pre-trauma life
    • Feelings of isolation, detachment, and disconnectedness from others

Increased physiological arousal:

  • Following a traumatic event, people remain chronically anxious, “on edge” and “on alert”. The person’s anxiety and fear systems become and stay activated, as if preparing them for the next “bad thing” to happen. Symptoms of persistent hyperarousal include:
    • Sleep difficulties
    • Anger/ irritability
    • Difficulty concentrating, attending, remembering
    • Being easily startled
    • Feeling unreal, dissociated or depersonalized
    • Hypervigilance

When people experience extreme physiological hyperarousal they may experience symptoms of dissociation including:

  • Depersonalization – feeling apart from or disconnected from oneself
  • Derealization – feeling apart from or disconnected from the world, as if the world isn’t real

Treating PTSD

In addition to lasting for a month or more, the symptoms of PTSD often cause severe distress and impairment in functioning. Fortunately, PTSD is a highly treatable condition and cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is the best treatment for it.

However, PTSD is often associated with depression, other anxiety disorders, and substance use problems. Understanding these other problems in the context of PTSD is important. The first step towards effective CBT for PTSD is a proper and thorough differential diagnostic assessment by a psychiatrist or psychologist.

A depressed person looking out a window.
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  • Adults
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  • Children & Adolescents
    • Treatment for Children & Adolescents
  • Third-Party Referrals & Services
  • Virtual Therapy
    • Virtual Therapy with CBTA
    • Live Sessions with MindBeacon
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    • About CBT Associates
    • The CBT Approach
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    • Train With Us
      • Supervised Practice
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    • Join Our Team
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