After hearing the sound of fireworks, the barking of a dog, or even just the sight of a weapon, something in a persons mind with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) will trigger. Horror will constantly torment the mind, no matter what or where the person is. This is part of what people diagnosed with PTSD go through on a daily basis. Unfortunately, little is known about why the human body induces this mental disorder, or why it takes so long to recover from. However, based off recent research, much has been discovered about the fundamentals of the mental illness. This essay discusses the symptoms, causes, and treatments of PTSD in order to give an understanding and perspective to readers on what it is like to live with PTSD.
Symptoms
Stress induced fear is a natural adaptation within the human body, which tells the mind what to stay away from in order to continue to survive. Therefore every traumatic event does not induce PTSD. A set criterion based on certain symptoms, has been set through the DSM-5 in order to properly diagnose someone with the mental illness. In order to diagnose a person with PTSD, the potential victim must have been exposed to death or some kind of threat to ones life, serious injury, or sexual violence in certain ways (American Psychology Association, 2013). People going through PTSD will experience a wide range of symptoms, all of which consists of fear. …show more content…
Often portrayed in movies, flashbacks and nightmares are PTSD episodes. These episodes are commonly depicted of reliving the traumatic event vividly. Flashbacks may be triggered by an object or situation, which can reanimate the traumatic event within the victim’s memory (American Psychology Association, 2013). Not only are nightmares symptoms of PTSD but nightmares are also a factor that causes another symptom—insomnia. According to Vandrey, Babson, Herrmann, and Bonn-Miller (2014), 70%-87% of people with PTSD experience insomnia, and up to 88% had presently experienced or actively experience nightmares. This shows that insomnia and nightmares are a core symptom seen throughout all PTSD victims. Deactivation symptoms are also experienced within PTSD, which include depression, emotional numbness, and avoidance of certain conditioned stimuli that has become a reminder of the turmeric event. Such symptoms also cause victims to become closed off from others to minimize confrontation with any conditioned stimuli (American Psychology Association 2013). Another class of symptoms incorporated with PTSD, is hyperarousal symptoms. Symptoms that are included are: outbursts of anger, recklessness, exaggerated startle response, and concentration difficulties (American Psychology Association, 2013). After the traumatic event the body stays in high alert with its sympathetic response system. The biology of the sympathetic response gives understanding to why hyperarousal is a core symptom of PTSD. In short, within the human biology is the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis which is the basis of the fight or flight stress response. A key component of the negative feedback system is a compound produced by the adrenal gland called cortisol. Recent studies have discovered that combat veteran subjects with PTSD showed a decreased amount of cortisol within blood in urine. This suggests that the low amount of cortisol levels is linked to the development of PTSD as it compromises the HPA axis, resulting in the overload of the sympathetic response (Sherin & Nemeroff, 2011). All of the symptoms listed must also consistently occur for more than a month, cause clinically significant stress onto daily life, and symptoms cannot be caused by the physiological affects of drugs (American Psychology Association). Therefore, those who do not meet the criteria above cannot be clinically diagnosed by a professional and could potentially be a different problem through a different source. Causes As there are many ways to develop PTSD, the key component in the development is the fear from being exposed to a potentially or actual life-threating event (Sherin & Nemeroff, 2011). …show more content…
The issue with PTSD is that, as certain conditioned responses are extinguished, some responses do not go through the extinction process—depending on the severity of the traumatic event—and cause victims to re-experience the trauma mentally for a prolonged time. As memory can be recalled through many contexts, the extinction process must affect all contexts in order to prevent the development of PTSD (VanElzakker, Dahlgren, David, Dubois, &
Symptoms
Stress induced fear is a natural adaptation within the human body, which tells the mind what to stay away from in order to continue to survive. Therefore every traumatic event does not induce PTSD. A set criterion based on certain symptoms, has been set through the DSM-5 in order to properly diagnose someone with the mental illness. In order to diagnose a person with PTSD, the potential victim must have been exposed to death or some kind of threat to ones life, serious injury, or sexual violence in certain ways (American Psychology Association, 2013). People going through PTSD will experience a wide range of symptoms, all of which consists of fear. …show more content…
Often portrayed in movies, flashbacks and nightmares are PTSD episodes. These episodes are commonly depicted of reliving the traumatic event vividly. Flashbacks may be triggered by an object or situation, which can reanimate the traumatic event within the victim’s memory (American Psychology Association, 2013). Not only are nightmares symptoms of PTSD but nightmares are also a factor that causes another symptom—insomnia. According to Vandrey, Babson, Herrmann, and Bonn-Miller (2014), 70%-87% of people with PTSD experience insomnia, and up to 88% had presently experienced or actively experience nightmares. This shows that insomnia and nightmares are a core symptom seen throughout all PTSD victims. Deactivation symptoms are also experienced within PTSD, which include depression, emotional numbness, and avoidance of certain conditioned stimuli that has become a reminder of the turmeric event. Such symptoms also cause victims to become closed off from others to minimize confrontation with any conditioned stimuli (American Psychology Association 2013). Another class of symptoms incorporated with PTSD, is hyperarousal symptoms. Symptoms that are included are: outbursts of anger, recklessness, exaggerated startle response, and concentration difficulties (American Psychology Association, 2013). After the traumatic event the body stays in high alert with its sympathetic response system. The biology of the sympathetic response gives understanding to why hyperarousal is a core symptom of PTSD. In short, within the human biology is the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis which is the basis of the fight or flight stress response. A key component of the negative feedback system is a compound produced by the adrenal gland called cortisol. Recent studies have discovered that combat veteran subjects with PTSD showed a decreased amount of cortisol within blood in urine. This suggests that the low amount of cortisol levels is linked to the development of PTSD as it compromises the HPA axis, resulting in the overload of the sympathetic response (Sherin & Nemeroff, 2011). All of the symptoms listed must also consistently occur for more than a month, cause clinically significant stress onto daily life, and symptoms cannot be caused by the physiological affects of drugs (American Psychology Association). Therefore, those who do not meet the criteria above cannot be clinically diagnosed by a professional and could potentially be a different problem through a different source. Causes As there are many ways to develop PTSD, the key component in the development is the fear from being exposed to a potentially or actual life-threating event (Sherin & Nemeroff, 2011). …show more content…
The issue with PTSD is that, as certain conditioned responses are extinguished, some responses do not go through the extinction process—depending on the severity of the traumatic event—and cause victims to re-experience the trauma mentally for a prolonged time. As memory can be recalled through many contexts, the extinction process must affect all contexts in order to prevent the development of PTSD (VanElzakker, Dahlgren, David, Dubois, &