Disorders and Treatment Introduction For this assignment, I will examine how cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) is effective approach for clients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Post-traumatic stress disorder is defined as "a mental health condition that is triggered by exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury or sexual violation," (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). It is natural to feel afraid during and after a distressing experience and most people can recover after the initial symptoms. But, people with PTSD continue to feel stressed and frightened after the experience is over. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 5th edition, "PTSD occurs when the individual 's exposure is from one or more of the following: • directly experiences the traumatic event; • witnesses the traumatic event in person; • learns that the traumatic event occurred to a close family member or close friend (with the actual or threatened death being either violent or accidental); or • experiences first-hand repeated or extreme exposure to aversive details of the traumatic event (not through media, pictures, television or movies unless work-related. The disturbance, regardless of its trigger, causes clinically significant distress or impairment in the individual’s social interactions, capacity to work or other important areas of functioning. It is not the physiological result of another medical condition, medication, drugs or
Another limitation that can appear when examining the memory of trauma is that trauma victims do not elicit the same response to trauma. Individuals who experience psychological trauma, physical trauma or both all remember the abuse differently. Many trauma victims may have repressed those memories or simply forget the explicit details about their traumatic experiences. Toth and Cicchetti (1998) argue that victims will elicit different responses of they are diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and experience trauma on a single or multiple occurrence. Multiple experiences of trauma may give individuals a general memory of the abuse, however, it often overlooks and forget about the unique features of their traumatic experience.
A person has been exposed to a traumatic event. For Charlie, there were two childhood instances that could count as “trauma.” First, he was sexually abused by his Aunt Helen as a child, a person he considered really close and important to him, “She was my favourite person in the world.” Second, she was killed around Christmas while driving to buy his present. As he loved her, the death had a toll on him. Another source of trauma is the death of his junior high friend by suicide. He describes
The first method of treatment is trauma-focused cognitive-behavioural therapy. In this method, a patient is gradually but carefully exposed to feelings, thoughts, and situations that trigger memories of the trauma. By identifying the thoughts that make the patient remember the traumatic event, thoughts that had been irrational or distorted are replaced with a balanced picture. Another productive method is family therapy since the family of the patient is also affected by PTSD. Family therapy is aimed at helping those close to the patient understand what he/she is going through. This understanding will help in the establishment of appropriate communication and ways of curbing problems resulting from the symptoms (Smith & Segal, 2011).
The medical definition of PTSD is that the person has been exposed to a traumatic event in which both the following were present: The person experienced, witnessed, or was confronted with an event or events that involved actual or threatened death or serious injury, or a threat to the physical integrity of self or others, The person’s response involved intense fear, helplessness, or horror
Trauma is an individual’s visceral reaction to a horrible event, events such as early childhood traumas, accidents, sexual abuse, or community violence (apa.org, 2016). An individual may react with shock and denial in the aftermath. As time continues some reactions may comprise of mood swings, intrusive memories, difficulties maintaining relationships and can manifest into physical symptoms to include headache or upset stomach. There are individuals who experience difficulties functioning in their daily lives; these observable responses are a normal response to the trauma (apa.org, 2016).
Frequently, as humans, we are faced with traumatic memories and experiences that prove to
This can happen in one of four ways. The first way is direct exposure, or being the person responsible for another's death. The second is witnessing it in person. The third is indirect, as in learning a family member was exposed to this trauma. The fourth way is repeated or extreme indirect exposure to traumatic events, such as first responders to an accident. Criteria B is known as the intrusion symptoms, where the event is relived in one of the following five ways. The first is recurrent memories, most of them involuntary. Next is traumatic nightmares about the event, and its details. The third way is through dissociative reactions, also known as flashbacks to the event, and can occur in brief flashback episodes to full loss of awareness to their surroundings. Number four is prolonged stress due to the event, and the last way is physiological reactivity after the exposure of a traumatic event. Criteria C is called avoidance, where you exhibit one of the two following symptoms. You will either have thoughts or feelings related to the trauma or physical reminders of the traumatic event, such as people, places, or things. Criteria D is negative changes in moods or comprehension, that have worsened after the event, and has seven symptoms. The first one is the inability to recall key details of the event or the day of the event, this is sometimes referred to as dissociative amnesia. Second is
PTSD is just one of the possible effects of trauma. People experience a range of reactions following a traumatic event. Many people who have PTSD also suffer from many issues regarding the
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder begins with some sort of terrible emotional or physical event, but the effects remain with the individual. You can experience the event by direct contact, sight, or learning of the trauma, usually involving death, catastrophic injury, or sexual assault. PTSD is a mental health condition that is tied closely with flashbacks, night terrors, rumination on the event and anxiety. Not all people who experience a terrifying event have PTSD, as with time and resiliency techniques, the residuals will go away. Some even using those techniques will develop PTSD. PTSD usually begins within the first three months after an event, but sometimes it will take years to develop. PTSD has
This cause included actual threatened or serious injury, threat to one’s physical integrity, witnessing an event that involves death, injury, or threat to the physical integrity of another person, also learning about unexpected or violent death, serious harm, or threat of death or injury experienced by a family member or other close associate. For example, I have friends that lives in Chicago. They always tell me how violent some parts of the area arevery dangerous. A couple of years ago I was told that one of my friends witnessed our friend getting shot to death. Now my friend can’t sleep at night, he has vivid memories of the moment it happened even if it was years ago. When we go through things in our life it puts us in different spaces which can be hard for an individual to move on from. Examples of traumatic events experienced directly include military combat, violent personal assault (sexual assault, physical attack, robbery, mugging, being kidnapped, being taken hostage, terrorists attack, torture, incarceration as a prisoner of war or in a concentrationcamp, natural or manmade disasters, severe automobile accidents. Examples of events experienced by others that are learned about. Learning of a violent personal assault, serious accident, or serious injury experienced by a family member or a close friend, learning about a sudden, unexpected death of a family member or close friend, learning that one’s child has a life-threatening disease. One learned event that has personally affected me has to be the death of my mom. My mom’s death was unexpected. When we go through things it makes us feel anavoid in our lives, at least that’s how I feel. I feel like a piece of my heart is gone from that experience. It was also traumatizing learning that one of my close friends from childhood was been molested by her father for years. When I found out about my friend going through that it made me very scared
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, PTSD for short, is a mental health state that is provoked by experiencing or seeing a horrifying event. Some symptoms of PTSD can include flashbacks, nightmares and anxiety. There are many types of PTSD that will be discussed. Along with the services these victims may receive, the various treatments they can get, and the outcome of each of these treatments.
The new DSM 5 identifies “exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence” via firsthand experience, observing or seeing others go through the traumatic experience, hearing about a traumatic incident that significantly affected a family or a friend, and direct repetitive exposure or re-experiencing of the traumatic event or details of it (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). Anyone of these situations can trigger the onset of PTSD and the symptoms can be very debilitating even life-threatening not just to the individuals with the disorder but to those around them.
What do you do when you experience a life threatening, traumatic event, and months later you are still experiencing the same frightening responses? Individuals who experience trauma are often forced to face their problems long after the event has happened. The first step to dealing with this issue would be to seek professional help as soon as possible so that they may be properly diagnosed and receive accurate treatment to overcome the intrusive symptoms. An individual who is suffering from symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have experienced, witnessed, or was affected by a life
The experience of trauma can be identified as either acute (e.g., natural disaster, serious accident) or chronic (e.g., physical abuse, sexual abuse), which