i was recently diagnosed with Ptsd but i have no idea what that means. Can you explain it please?
As always, I am a mental health provider, but not YOUR mental health provider. For advice and information specific to any individuals mental health, please consult with a professional. This is for educational purposes, only:
Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is one of the only mental illnesses for which we really understand the cause. In order to develop PTSD, two things have to happen together. First you need something called a “biological predisposition.” Like many kinds of mental illness, there are genetically based risk factors underlying PTSD. Second, you need to experience a traumatic event. Traumatic events are usually ones that are life-threatening, where someone may feel intense fear, horror, or helplessness, or may come close to death, or witness the death of others.
The facts are that the majority of people who experience traumatic events do not go on to develop PTSD. In fact, following a trauma, many people experience something called “post-traumatic growth.”
But for some people, who have a certain genetic predisposition, the intense fear response will trigger lasting changes in how your brain works. A lot of those changes will be related to your mid-brain, and what psychologists jokingly call the “Four Fs.” Feeding, Fleeing, Fighting, and Mating.
PTSD interferes with the brains ability to regulate the “fight or flight” response. It will cause your brain to initiate changes in your body to prepare for running or fighting for survival, even though the environment doesn’t require that from you. You might get angry and irritable really easy, not sleep long or deeply (think about how badly you slept as a kid when you were afraid of the dark…you are sleeping lightly to detect predators and danger, so you usually don’t get good rest), have nightmares, or even flashbacks that are like reliving the trauma. And, because the “Four Fs” are designed to be mutually exclusive biological functions (meaning your body isn’t designed to do 2 of them at once), constantly going into “fight or flight” mode interferes with your appetite and digestion. Many people I know with PTSD complain about stomach problems. It also often interferes with your interest in and enjoyment of sex.
Because your brain is often glitching into “high alert” mode, you may startle easy. And, because during the “fight or flight” response, your body needs to react in a life threatening situation to survive, your brain tells your body put all of it’s energy into that, turning off other “higher order” abstract thought processes. So you don’t concentrate well. And, of course, constant sleep problems just make that worse.
Additionally, in order to give your body a break from constant “fight or flight” reactions, you may start to avoid all sorts of things that remind you of the original traumatic event. Of course, you may start to increase what you avoid, and how much time and energy you spend in avoiding triggers, and that can also cause problems in your life.
There are different kinds of therapeutic approaches to PTSD. Some kinds of therapy help you reduce your reaction to your triggers. The goal is to decrease the times you will go into fight or flight mode.
There are medications that may also be prescribed for this, as well as medications for sleep, and for reducing nightmares.
Additionally, mindfulness meditation is an effective treatment for PTSD, with the goal of reducing your “flight or fight” episodes by helping your brain stay less “aroused” and more relaxed in your day to day baseline.
Finally, a word of caution about substance use. Many people with PTSD go on to use alcohol and other drugs to reduce their symptoms. However, people who do this often go on to not only have the problems associated with PTSD, but also those of a substance abuse disorder. People with PTSD are recommended to abstain from alcohol and other drugs, because those drugs often interfere with recovery, and are usually associated with worse outcomes.
Some experts believe you can recover from PTSD, while others suggest that the bests outcomes are to improve your brain’s functioning through medication, therapy, and mindfulness, with the goal of getting symptoms under control and learning to live with them.
Regards, you should know that many people who are diagnosed with PTSD go on to have amazing lives. Recovery is possible, and probable.
