Dreaming and Post-traumatic Stress Disorder: The Connection

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a relatively new diagnosis that was associated with survivors of war when it was first introduced. Its diagnosis was met largely with skepticism and dismissal by the public of the validity of the illness. PTSD was only widely accepted when it was included as a diagnosis in 1980 in the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III) of the American Psychiatric Association. PTSD is a complex mental disorder that develops in response to exposure to a severe traumatic event that stems a cluster of symptoms. Being afflicted with the disorder is debilitating, disrupting an individual’s ability to function and perform the most basic tasks.

According to the Mayo Clinic, post-traumatic stress disorder is a mental disability that “triggered by a terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it.” Symptoms found by the Cleveland Clinic include repeated, intrusive memories of the event, nightmares about the event, intense distress, anxiety, persistent negative emotions, amnesia, decreased interest in everyday things, and feeling hopeless about the future. Sometimes, the symptoms will not show up until months or even years after the event and can cause significant problems in functioning in work and

According to an article published in the International Journal of Psychiatry in Medicine, PTSD is an anxiety disorder that is triggered by a traumatic event that has endangered one’s physical integrity of one’s self, witnessing an event where death, injury, or threat of someone else’s physical integrity has occurred, as well as learning about traumatic events that has happened to someone close to the PTSD victim, much like it was described as in the book (Mendes, Mello, Ventura, Passarela, Mari, 2008). According to an article written by Naomi Breslau (2009), the term Posttraumatic Stress Disorder is actually a fairly new diagnosis as it was only adopted into the third edition of the DSM, published in 1980. PTSD was once considered a fairly rare condition, according to Keane, Marshall, and Taft, (2006), but as the years have passed more and more research has come out and it turns out that PTSD is in fact fairy common, especially among sexual abuse victims and combat warriors, however anyone can experience this disorder if they experience a trauma for themselves. PTSD is ultimately a product of extreme fear, according to C. Lin, Tung, P. Lin, Huang, and Liu (2016), in a recent article, as the memories of the traumatic event intrude on the areas of the brain that are associated with fear such as the prefrontal cortex, hippocampus and the amygdala. Since memories of fear generally become extinct fairly easily, it takes an extreme case of fear to engrain itself into your brain and stay with you as it does with

Those diagnosed with PTSD have shown a reduction in the volume of the hippocampus. The hippocampus helps humans remember new memories and then be able to recall them later, and also helps identify between past and present memories. The amygdala is another section of the brain affected by PTSD, and the amygdala is responsible for processing emotions and fear. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is shown to have a decreased size in cases. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex regulates negative emotions like stress, anxiety, and fear. The strange behaviours of the patients diagnosed with PTSD can be explained by the damage to the brain. “Researchers believe that the brain changes caused by PTSD increase the tendency of a person developing other psychotic and mood disorders” (brainblogger.com). The brain is like a machine made up of small parts, and if one of these parts break, the machine does not function

Traumatic events also produce profound and lasting changes in physiological arousal, emotion, cognition, and memory. Moreover, traumatic events may result in the severance of these normally integrated functions from one another. Traumatized individuals may also suffer from the memories of the tragic or horrifying experiences they have undergone. Frequently, as a result of these many symptoms, it becomes inevitable for the individual to develop certain complications associated with trauma-related disorders, such as posttraumatic stress disorder.

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD as it is more commonly referred to, is defined by the American Psychiatric Association as an anxiety disorder. (American Psychological Association.) It has specific criteria that need to be met in order to be

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a mental condition that is normally associated with military combat veterans. Specifically, it is classified as an anxiety disorder that sometimes occurs after being exposed to a traumatic or terrifying event or incident. The Mayo Clinic defines PTSD as a mental health condition that 's triggered by a terrifying event. It is also defined as an anxiety disorder that can develop after the exposure to a terrifying event or ordeal in which grave physical harm occurred or was threatened (Staff, 2014). PTST affects a significant number of our military combat veterans; it can affect anyone who has been subjected to such things as terror events, natural disasters, domestic violence, serious traffic

When the body does not calm down sometime after the situation it experiences PTSD. Soon after, suffering from nightmares, lack of sleep and flashbacks become common side effects of the disorder.

Post-traumatic stress disorder, also known as PTSD, is a complicated disorder that begins after a traumatic event ((APA), May 18, 2013). Throughout history, PTSD was also known as railway spine, shell shock, traumatic (war) neurosis, concentration-camp syndrome, and rape-trauma syndrome. This disorder always happens after a personal tragic event. Such events include a natural disaster, murder, war, rape, and vehicular accidents, just to name a few. The important thing to remember is that it is always a personal event with a high rate of mortality (Gillian T Eagle, 2015). If someone witnesses a tragic event but is not directly affected, they could still have Post -Traumatic Stress Disorder if it was personal to them.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder a type of mental health disorder that occurs after experiencing a traumatic event or a series of events that creates psychological symptoms that eventually lead to behavioral changes. This happens to people who have witnessed terrorizing circumstances. It is normal for your mind or body to be in shock after being in a catastrophic circumstance, with PTSD your nervous system gets stuck in a shocked state of mind which eventually leads to PTSD. This may take hours, days, or possibly months following the event for symptoms to side. There are four symptom groups, recurrent, extreme avoidance, negative changes in thoughts and mood, and being on guard all the time. When experiencing recurrent symptoms you go will have

What is Posttraumatic Stress Disorder? The American Psychiatric Association (2013) describes Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) as a serious disorder that can put the mental and physical health of an individual with PTSD at risk (p.3). Posttraumatic Stress Disorder can be formed by a variety of situations. The American Psychiatric Association (2013) states that Posttraumatic Stress Disorder can be formed by the exposure to death, rape, any serious injury, and many other stressful situations (p. 3). The American Psychiatric Association (2013) also describes the symptoms of PTSD as “irritability, aggressiveness, self-destructiveness, reckless behavior, hypervigilance, exaggerated startle response, difficulty concentrating, and sleep disturbances

PTSD is the abbreviation for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The general classification according to the DSM-V is 309.81 with an Axis I. This disorder is no longer classified as an anxiety disorder rather it is now classified as a trauma and stressor related disorder. That means anyone who experienced (direct exposure), witnessed or was confronted with an event that they might have feared for their life, and or caused serious injury to them, such as a sexual trauma event like rape. This can happen to anyone at any age, it is not just a soldier’s disorder and it haunts them for a very long time. In order to be diagnosed with PTSD there is a criterion that they use to evaluate or meet the individual’s needs for treatment. The

inhibit post traumatic stress disorder in individuals is a big concern. Post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is classified as an anxiety disorder in the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.) Symptoms include unsettling recurring flashbacks, and avoiding to talk about the event or feeling numb when it is brought up. Other symptoms include physiological and psychological tension, and could continue for months after the traumatic experience have happened. Post traumatic stress disorder is believed to be caused by the events of risking a person’s like such as warfare, sexual assaults, and traffic collisions.

People who are associated with PTSD, post traumatic stress disorder, suffer from what is known as disrupted context processing. Disrupted context processing is an important part in the brain that tells you how to react to a certain stimulus. If you are in a harmful, scary, exciting, or upsetting setting, this part in the brain tells you how to react differently depending on what kind of situation you are in. Areas in the brain that are disrupted from this disorder are the Hippocampus, Prefrontal Cortex, and the Amygdala. The new theory of PTSD being connected with disrupted context processing are being studied by the University of Michigan Health System. This is all a new study, although they have been looking into this for a long time, this

The amygdala is known to learn from exposure to fear and store assessment of threat–related stimuli. The prefrontal cortex is involved in extinction and the retention of fear and is connected to the amygdala. Finally, the hippocampus encodes the context during fear learning process and sends it to the amygdala. People with PTSD have hyper-activity in the amygdala, while having hypo-activity in the prefrontal cortex and there is reduction of the hippocampus volume. This reduction may limit proper evaluation and categorization of the experience. A study on Vietnam soldiers revealed that lesions in the amygdala and prefrontal cortex resulted in the absence of PTSD. To get further into the molecular level studies been done on the hormonal system. “Stress is known to contribute to the pathogenesis of a variety of disorders, including the majority of psychiatric like major depression and posttraumatic stress disorder.” (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3825244/pdf/DM30-02-343616.pdf). Research has revealed evidence that a hormonal system known as the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis is the one that gets disrupted in people with PTSD. The hormonal system is involved in normal stress reactions, so the disruption of this system in people with PTSD creates this “false alarm”. It has been suggested by some scientist that the dysfunction of the HPA system results in hippocampal damage in people with PTSD. Damage in the hormones is caused by damage to