Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, PTSD is a psychiatric complication that happens after the encounter or participation of life-threatening and horrific events (Ozer, Best, Lipsey & Weiss, 2003). This particular condition is mostly associated with the American veterans because they are the ones who are always in life-threatening battlefields and witness people dying in cold-blood. Moreover, the soldiers do participate in the killing of people. In other cases, soldiers normally witness their colleagues being butchered or murdered by the assailants. However, the disease may happen to any other person as long as they have experienced such traumatizing conditions. For instance, children who witnessed their parents being murdered ruthlessly by intruders or gangs in the home may develop PTSD. It is important to note that this specific paper is limited to the case of the American military solders, who are the ones with the highest incidence of the disorder.
Explaining of the disorder
The survivors of this trauma usually return to normality after a long period of time. In other special cases, victims may experience stress reactions that are persistent and non-stop. In fact, this stress may get worse after sometime. Such people normally develop PTSD, which is the advanced level of the depression. It is vital to observe that individuals who suffer from PTSD normally recollect the bad experiences through nightmares and flashbacks. They normally have difficulties in sleeping and always feel detached or estranged. In events where these feelings persist and get advanced, they can impair the normal daily life of the victim.
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Symptoms
Individuals who have PTSD usually experience various symptoms. The first conspicuous symptom is frequent recollection of the traumatic events. Secondly, PTSD victims normally deliberately avoid specific places ort even the people, especially friends who remind them of the bad incidents. It is also important to note that another major symptom of people who have this condition is high irritability.
It is also notable that PTSD is normally characterized by clear changes in a person’s psychological system. There are also the psychological symptoms. It is also important to note that the victims of PTSD always tend to turn to substance abuse and alcoholism in a bid to forget and get free from the memories and trauma of the ad events (Monson, Schnurr, Resick, Friedman, Young-Xu & Stevens, 2006). Moreover, a person’s social life is greatly affected once he or she develops PTSD. Importantly, paranoia is a major symptom of PTSD. A person gets weak in terms his or her sense of trust for others. They cannot trust anybody else other themselves and a chosen few, like mother and father. Therefore, there are different categories of the symptoms of PTSD.
The first is made up of the avoidance and numbing symptoms. This type of symptoms is made up of behaviors geared towards escaping being part of a given event or attending a specific function, which is deemed as likely to relive the traumatic incident. Victims even avoid television programs that remind them about the nasty incident. Some put in much effort to ensure they avoid mingling with people that may bring about the memories of the nasty event. It is also common to find such a person simply staying numb always in order to avoid talking and being reminded of the past fatal incident.
There are also the arousal symptoms. This category of symptoms involves the feelings of alertness after experiencing the traumatic incident. The impact of the arousal symptoms includes loss of sleep and being ballistic as well as easily irritable. There is also the category of re-experiencing symptoms. These are feelings that put one in the situation of the event within the imaginary mind. It happens during nightmares, where a person imagines he is experiencing the past traumatic incident again.
The American Military
As noted above, the American military soldiers are the most affected by this specific condition. PTSD has come to be known as the war disorder because of its large association with the military soldiers (Litz, Orsillo, Friedman, Ehlich & Batres, 1997). Research has established that the American military now has the highest rate of PTSD in the United States of America. According to the RAND statistics, virtually 20% of the veterans who participated in the Iraq and Afghanistan War have got PTSD and depression disorders (Seppälä, Nitschke, Tudorascu, Hayes, Goldstein, Nguyen & Davidson, 2014).
Scientific has shown that the military soldiers who are exposed to war trauma have a high risk of developing PTSD. It is important to note that the ones who are exposed to high levels of war-related stress have the biggest risk of developing PTSD. Others with the highest risk of developing PTSD include those wounded serious during the battles and the ones incarcerated as the war prisoners.
There are various post-military factors, which normally determine the intensity of the risk to traumatic experiences by the soldiers. These factors include the kind of social support available and the coping skills of the victim (Friedman, Schnurr & McDonagh-Coyle, 1994). It is also reported that there are specific populations that are at highest risk of PTSD. The first population is that of women, whose experiences may be worsened by the sexual assaults committed against them in the course of the war. The colored military soldiers also have the highest risk of PTSD because of the issues of racism they encounter during the battles.
It is important to note that for all many veterans, the return from their military assignments within war-zones implies struggling to cope up with the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. Most of these veterans normally find it quite hard to readjust back to normal life after the military service.
Main Causes of PTSD
It is understood that the prime cause of PTSD is stressful event experience. There are different ways in which the nervous system normally responds to a stressful event. Mobilization usually takes place when a person has to defend oneself or survive through a danger presented during a combat situation. At this time, one’s heart normally pounds faster as blood pressure increases. Moreover, the muscles do become tight hence enhancing strength and speed of reaction. After the dissipation of the danger, the nervous system takes action by cooling down the body. This cooling effect normally reduces the blood pressure as well as the heart rate. There is also immobilization process, which takes place when a lot of stress is experienced in a situation even after the dissipation of the danger. In this specific case, the nervous system is normally unable to regain its normal state. One becomes unable to move on from the event. It is the condition that leads to the development of PTSD.
Recovery from PTSD
There are measures that can be taken by the veterans in order to regain their normal state of psychology and mind. These strategies involve some level of concentration and determination by the victim of PTSD. Veterans are supposed to try and get moving on. Moving on involves engaging in activities that push the mind away from the thoughts of the incident. These are activities that also help to burn off a person’s adrenalin. Some of the significant activities that must be considered in order to recover from the condition of PTSD include physical exercise. Physical exercise is a progressive strategy that can help a person to permanently move away from the thoughts of a fatal incident. Therefore, the veterans must form a habit of participating in physical exercises daily to help improve their moods.
The other major control measure to curb the effect of PTSD is intensive socialization and connection with people. The veteran must always spend time with jovial people around him or her. These are the people who offer the veteran some helpful social support when he or she is in the deep recollection thoughts about the past horrific incident. Overall, PTSD is simply a matter of proper control for it to end. The veterans must form a habit of connecting with the civilians in order to overcome this effect. Moreover, there are pharmaceutical control and treatment measures that can be considered.
References
Friedman, M. J., Schnurr, P. P., & McDonagh-Coyle, A. (1994). Post-traumatic stress disorder in the military veteran. Psychiatric Clinics of North America , 17 (2), 265-278.
Litz, B. T., Orsillo, S. M., Friedman, M., Ehlich, P., & Batres, A. (1997). Posttraumatic stress disorder associated with peacekeeping duty in Somalia for US military personnel. American Journal of Psychiatry , 154 (2), 178-184.
Monson, C. M., Schnurr, P. P., Resick, P. A., Friedman, M. J., Young-Xu, Y., & Stevens, S. P. (2006). Cognitive processing therapy for veterans with military-related posttraumatic stress disorder. Journal of Consulting and clinical Psychology , 74 (5), 898.
Ozer, E. J., Best, S. R., Lipsey, T. L., & Weiss, D. S. (2003). Predictors of posttraumatic stress disorder and symptoms in adults: a meta-analysis. Psychological bulletin , 129 (1), 52.
Seppälä, E. M., Nitschke, J. B., Tudorascu, D. L., Hayes, A., Goldstein, M. R., Nguyen, D. T., ... & Davidson, R. J. (2014). Breathing‐based meditation decreases posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms in US Military veterans: A randomized controlled longitudinal study. Journal of traumatic stress , 27 (4), 397-405.
