TRAUMA

Treatment and Recovery from Trauma

Table of Contents

Introduction1

General issues around stress1

Treatment for trauma2

Treatment considerations2

Individual Psychotherapy3

Multimodality trauma treatment3

Behavioral or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)3

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)3

Hypnosis4

Group therapy4

Medication4

PTSD4

Conclusion5

References6

Treatment and Recovery from Trauma

Introduction

Trauma may be defined as a serious injury or an emotional wound that may be the result of accident or violence. About 12% of the people in USA suffer from trauma (Duckworth, 1990). Any traumatic event can take a person into a state of trauma, and when this changes to post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD, biological and emotional changes take place in the body. Different people have different responses to the traumatic incidents that happen in their life. These reactions occur in three phases. These phases are Pre trauma, peri trauma and post traumatic stage. The reactions in these three stages of stress can be either or a combination of emotional, cognitive, behavioral, physical and interpersonal (Duckworth, 1990).

Emotional - feelings such as anxiety, irritability, isolation and denial characterize these emotional changes.

Cognitive - these involve sentiments such as flashbacks, holing oneself responsible, loss of the ability to analyze one's situation.

Physical - these include headaches, weight loss, tremors, and fatigue.

Behavioral - significant increase or decrease in appetite, introvert attitude and others.

Interpersonal - lack of affection towards the intimate partner, lack of communication, distrust and others.

General issues around stress

When understanding the steps that should be taken to cope with stress, it is important to understand that not all traumatic people need professional help as most people have the ability to settle their feelings over time. Coping with stress requires that a person should be able to give himself time. It is human to be in a state of shock and denial as the result of a traumatic event. The first step in coping with stress involves acknowledging ones feelings. Facing the reality is often very difficult, but it is better to face the reality than to live in denial. Self efficacy is good but in scenarios where the person fails to control his emotions and finds any of the symptoms of trauma, he should seek for professional help (Regehr, 2003). The professional help is most important when others suggest that the person needs help. This is important because the person is unable to note the changes in one's own behavior. Hence, people around us are in a better position, to understand and note the changes in our behavior.

Treatment for trauma

Treatment considerations

The first step towards the treatment of trauma involves the diagnosis of trauma. These include diagnosing the trauma that the person is suffering from, what is the level of severity and how chronic it is (Giles, 2007). In addition, the treatment of trauma requires developing a personal profile of the person who comes in for help. The various treatment options that a person has available are the function of his age, gender, life expectancy and other issues. This is important as many people have misconceptions about the absence of ...