Trauma

A traumatic experience can be a one-time event, such as a natural disaster or car accident, or an ongoing stress, like living in an abusive household or serving in military combat. A traumatic experience can be any situation that causes you to feel intensely overwhelmed, scared and powerless. Immediately after such an event, you may experience shock and may not recognize how you have been impacted. In the days and weeks after a traumatic event, you may experience stressful flashbacks that can leave you struggling to shake debilitating emotional and sometimes physical symptoms.

Yes. Some of the most common are:

 

• Headaches and migraines
• Difficulty sleeping or sleeping too much
• Nightmares
• Fatigue
• A racing heartbeat
• Muscle tension
• Nausea or stomach upset

Fortunately, there are many approaches that can effectively treat the psychological and physical symptoms of trauma. These include:

 

• • • Psychotherapy. Often referred to as “talk therapy,” psychotherapy involves open dialogue in a compassionate, supportive, nonjudgmental environment. Your therapist is highly-trained in identifying and helping you process various aspects of a traumatic experience. Psychotherapy may also help you recognize situations that may trigger negative or anxious feelings and/or memories, and gives you the tools to recognize those feelings, and respond with distress-reduction skills and self-compassion.
    • Medication management. The Clinic’s doctors use medication, as needed and when desired by the patient, to manage symptoms, such as: depression, anxiety, nightmares, sleep disturbance, and mood-related problems that can result from traumatic experiences.
    • Biofeedback. This is a technique in which you are connected to a seamless and painless external monitoring device in order to learn to control your body’s reactions, such as a rapid heart rate and shortness of breath.