What is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder? Here’s the Explanation

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder that makes sufferers remember traumatic events. Some traumatic events that cause PTSD include accidents, natural disasters, sexual harassment, and war.

To find out if someone has PTSD, there are several characteristics that generally appear. What are the characteristics and causes of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)? Here’s an explanation.

Causes of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

Although it is not known for certain, however, the cause of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is thought to be a combination of the following conditions:

• Family history of mental disorders.
• Temperamental innate personality.
• Unpleasant experience.

Events that most often cause PTSD, namely:

• Accident.
• Natural disasters.
• War.
• Sexual harassment.
• Physical abuse.
• Bullying.
• Life-threatening illness, such as a heart attack.
• Certain medical procedures, such as surgery.

Characteristics of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

When someone experiences PTSD, there are several characteristics that arise, including:

1. Negative thoughts and feelings

The most common feature of people with PTSD is having negative thoughts about themselves and others. This causes the sufferer to lose interest in doing the things he likes. Sufferers also prefer to be alone, making it difficult to establish relationships with other people.

2. Always remember the traumatic event

Constantly remembering the event that triggered the trauma is also another PTSD feature. When remembering a traumatic event, it seems as if the sufferer is repeating the traumatic event, thus making him depressed. For example, often have nightmares.

3. Changes in behavior and emotions

Traumatic events make people with PTSD easily scared or angry. These changes in behavior often endanger themselves or others. The effect, sufferers become difficult to sleep and concentrate.

Even though it can happen to anyone, from children to adults, there are some specific symptoms of PTSD in children, namely:

• Even though they are able to urinate in the toilet, PTSD makes children wet the bed frequently.
• Frequently reliving the traumatic event through play.
• Not daring to be away from parents or siblings, even if only briefly.

PTSD treatment

Here are some methods that can be used to defuse the patient’s emotional response and teach the patient how to control himself well when reminded of the traumatic event:

1. Psychotherapy

This treatment is done if the PTSD is already severe, namely psychotherapy combined with the use of drugs. This can be done individually or together with several other PTSD patients.

Here are some of the psychotherapeutic procedures that are often performed to treat PTSD patients:

• Cognitive behavioral therapy.

This method is used to identify and change the patient’s mindset, from negative to positive.

• Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR).

This method aims to change the patient’s focus to certain sounds or object movements when remembering events that trigger trauma.

Ways that aim to help patients manage memories that trigger trauma.

2. Drugs

To treat PTSD patients, there are several types of drugs that are often used, namely:

• Anti-anxiety medication, to treat anxiety.
• The drug Prazosin, to prevent nightmares.
• Antidepressant drugs, used to treat depression.

If the above drugs do not reduce symptoms, the doctor will increase the dose. However, if effective, the use of drugs will continue, at least up to 1 year, then gradually discontinued.