Essay Sample on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

L. is a twenty-year-old adult female, who has recently been accepted into college where she works towards a degree in teaching younger aged kids. However, prior to this at the age of five years old L. had to suffer from a string of traumatic episodes day in and day out due to an uncle she lived with at the time abusing her both physically and sexually all the way up until the age of thirteen. This went on for so long because she was afraid of telling someone because of the lies the uncle told her, telling her that she would be found disgusting and that everyone would think that it was her fault. The only way this abuse ended was when one of her friends from school had the courage to speak up for her and which resulted in the uncle’s arrest. Of course, after these incidents however she went through routine amounts of therapy and psychiatric help as well as mental hospital care, due to a psychotic break. She eventually would be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. The road to healing is a long one and no one truly recovers from a disorder such as hers but learns to live with it. 

When someone goes through abuse for as long as L. has there are plenty of signs of post-traumatic stress disorder. Some psychological symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder that L. exhibits would be, being directly exposed to the traumatic event. As well as avoiding an entire city and state because of the vile things that occurred to her while she resided there. Other symptoms include problems with concentration, exaggerated startle response, sleep disturbance, as well as feelings of detachment from those closest to her (American Psychiatric Association 2013, pg.272). She also does not exhibit any distinct dissociative, depersonalization, nor derealization symptoms. Other associated features supporting this diagnosis would be the result of having auditory pseudo-hallucinations in which she hears her thoughts in two or more voices. These are then supported in the Diagnostics and Statistics Manual Five as supporting a case for post-traumatic stress disorder (American Psychiatric Association 2013, pg. 276). 

Causes of this disorder include, according to both the Diagnostic and Statistics Manual Five as well as WebMD, exposure to a traumatic experience either experienced directly or indirectly through witnessing the events. This disorder is experienced more in females than males and it has been found that females also experience this disorder for a longer time this is likely caused by the higher likely hood that females will experience more traumatic events in their lifetime than males. The risk of suicide is also higher for individuals with this disease because it is associated with traumatic events. This disorder is most commonly found in veterans who have served overseas and witness horrible atrocities of war while deployed and being gone from their families and loved ones for nine months to a year and not feeling like they have anyone to turn to, to the survivors of physical, mental, or sexual assault. With symptoms being onset mainly after three months of the event in question occurring (American Psychiatric Association 2013 pg.276) (Smith, 2003).

L. has survived from years of sexual abuse from her uncle from the time she was only five years old up until she graduated from middle school as well as the physical abuse that comes with this horrible act, on top of being pressured into keeping these things a secret for years and years in fear from being blamed for everything that had happened as well as losing her entire family as she knew it was horribly mentally manipulated and abused as well. Thusly, she falls well within the range that psychiatrists believe of what causes this disorder and is a prime example, nonetheless. 

There are treatment options available for those with post-traumatic stress disorder, some of these options include therapies these can include both group therapies which can show themselves in cases like support groups and talks with therapists and psychiatrists as well as drug therapies where people in need who have tried other therapies and talked with their psychiatrist are prescribed medical drugs to help combat their disorders, there are four main types of drug therapies antianxiety drugs, antipsychotic drugs, mood stabilizers, and antidepressants. While a person can be prescribed both antianxiety and antipsychotic medicines for comorbid disorders that may arise from suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, these would not be the primary help for combating post-traumatic stress disorder with medicinal drugs, the most common type that many people with post-traumatic stress disorder take are antidepressants, which gradually improve mood over time and bring a person out of a depression which is common for people with post-traumatic stress disorder to develop. As well as mood stabilizers which are used to control mood swings in an individual and combat the rapid flux of emotions that may be caused by post-traumatic stress disorder at any given time, which in turn will produce fewer episodes in the future. These therapies can produce clear cut therapeutic gains for many individuals and can create more gain where other therapies may fail in efforts to better a persons psychological physiological state as a whole (Weiten et al. pg.445). 

Another therapy that has shown promise in those with post-traumatic stress disorder is more on the physical side. That being the manual stimulation of acupuncture points all around the body as studied on by Dawson Church and David Feinstein. These tests were run on volunteer veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder from being in combat situations while deployed overseas. The findings in this article found that exposing certain points to pressure while engaging in quick imaginal exposure resulted in lower responses to the traumatic events and other significant factors related to the trauma the individual was exposed to. These findings represent hope that there can be alternative ways to help individuals with post-traumatic stress disorders and have them manage their reactions to grave reminders of their events that they have went through and be able to live better and healthier lives as a whole because of it (Church and Feinstein 2017). 

Another form of treatment for individuals with post-traumatic stress disorder is being newly studied and a sample group of veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder was used to test its effectiveness on the psychiatric disorder. The study was conducted using a hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which brings more oxygen into the tissue of the body and in turn can help alleviate effected areas. So much so that this study suggests that these therapies can even help improve brain function leading to better functioning mechanisms of the brain overall and a healthier individual in the long run.  In the randomized group that saw treatment improvements on an fMRI concluded that improved brain functionality, microstructure, and symptoms of those veterans that had treatment resistant versions of post-traumatic stress disorder. According to new research from PLOS ONE and Doenyas-Barak in 2022 the authors state “Improved brain activity was seen in fMRI in the left dorsolateral prefrontal, middle temporal gyri, both thalami, left hippocampus and left insula. The DTI showed significant increases in fractional anisotropy in the fronto-limbic white-matter, genu of the corpus callosum and fornix.” This shows that new therapies are still emerging to help those who suffer with this psychiatric disease. As a result post-traumatic stress disorder is something one has to learn to live with and will for the rest of their lives but there are ways that this disorder can be dealt with and can help a person live the rest of their lives in control of themselves and their actions without fear.

References

American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th Edition: DSM-5 (5th ed.). American Psychiatric Publishing.

Church, D., & Feinstein, D. (2017). The Manual Stimulation of Acupuncture Points in the Treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: A Review of Clinical Emotional Freedom Techniques. Medical Acupuncture, 29(4), 194–205. https://doi.org/10.1089/acu.2017.1213

Doenyas-Barak, K., Catalogna, M., Kutz, I., Levi, G., Hadanny, A., Tal, S., Daphna-Tekoha, S., Sasson, E., Shechter, Y., & Efrati, S. (2022). Hyperbaric oxygen therapy improves symptoms, brain’s microstructure and functionality in veterans with treatment resistant post-traumatic stress disorder: A prospective, randomized, controlled trial. PLOS ONE, 17(2), e0264161. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0264161

Smith, M. (2003, February 10). Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). WebMD. Retrieved July 8, 2022, from https://www.webmd.com/mental-health/post-traumatic-stress-disorder

Weiten, W., Dunn, D. S., & Hammer, E. Y. (2017). Psychology Applied to Modern Life: Adjustment in the 21st Century (12th ed.). Cengage Learning.