What is PTSD?
Post-traumatic stress disorder is an anxiety disorder. In its simplest terms, it's a specific set of symptoms that result from a traumatic experience. These symptoms must present themselves in a certain way over within a certain period of time and for a certain duration to be considered PTSD.
The cornerstone symptom of PTSD is reexperience of the trauma. This means the sufferer is plagued with unwanted memories of the event that so badly scarred him. These memories can come in the form of dreams, flashbacks and recollections. In each of these instances, memories of the event suddenly and unexpectedly flood the mood of the sufferer, and it's like he's experiencing the event over and over again. This can be triggered by a cue (like seeing or hearing a car accident similar to the one the sufferer endured), or it can come unbidden. The sufferer's brain releases chemicals as if she is experiencing the trauma, creating a fear response that's both physical and mental.
 Photo courtesy Sisse Brimberg/National Geographic/Getty Images. Seventy percent of Americans have endured a traumatic experience. Here, survivors of the 1999 Columbine High School shootings in Colorado remember one of the students killed that day. |
- Avoidance - the sufferer will go out of his way to avoid being reminded of the trauma. He'll avoid speaking about the trauma and will avoid any cues that may trigger memories of the trauma. In effect, the sufferer tries to push any memories of the experience from his mind.
- Numbness - in response to the pain created by the haunting memories, the sufferer may seek out anything that can keep away the pain, including alcohol and drugs. He may withdraw and can lose his ability to make and maintain relationships.
- Hyper-arousal - a state of continuous heightened awareness. PTSD sufferers who display this symptom are easily irritated, jumpy, and will also have difficulty sleeping. He may feel unsafe and be constantly guarded.
The tricky part in diagnosing the disorder is that, after a trauma, most people experience the same symptoms as a person with PTSD suffers. The distinction is that these symptoms fade voluntarily over time, whereas those with the disorder continue to be plagued by anxiety.
For example, anyone who is in a serious wreck will predictably be shaken by the event. Generally, a person will eventually get past the event and move on with his life. He will be able to remember the event without becoming terrified. He will be able to pass by another car wreck without reexperiencing in detail his own. A person with PTSD will not. The PTSD sufferer is continually negotiating the mental and physical side effects of his traumatic event.
So researchers have attached stipulations to the PTSD diagnosis. Chief among them is that for a person to be considered a PTSD sufferer, he must have the symptoms for more than one month. These symptoms may present themselves in various ways:
- Acute - symptoms last three months or less
- Chronic - symptoms last more than three months
- Delayed onset - symptoms don't show up for at least six months
A child who suffers from PTSD may present different symptoms. She may behave badly, become needier, and reexperience the event through drawings and explicit reenactment the trauma. As children with PTSD grow older, research has shown that these symptoms will come to more closely resemble adult symptoms [source: Perry].
Who are the people who suffer from PTSD? And why are some people more likely than others to develop it? In the next section, we'll find out what researchers have uncovered about susceptibility to PTSD.
Learn more about what ails you. Here are some common symptoms.
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