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Reading a book on Vietnam, Long Time Passing/Vietnam & The Haunted Generation, there's a chapter on PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and I'm learning now that PTSD can happen to just about anyone, who's not been traumatized in the military. Where have I been? Not knowing that?
Being in a natural disaster, or car accident, can cause it as well! In the book it points out a disastrous flood in West Virginia, in 1972, where a dam broke loose, with mining refuge, which flooded some towns in a valley. 10 years later, there were people, when it rained, they grabbed their car keys and fled, until it was over!
Yes, I can see, if my trailer was blown away by a tornado in Oklahoma, and me with it, (yes, you can be airlifted and deposited miles away!) my sleep might be interrupted for weeks, months afterwards!
Most shocking, is finding out about delayed reactions, which can occur 5-10-15-20 years afterwards!
So I'm wondering what else can cause PTSD? And how many have been misdiagnosed as a result of it?
Interesting, that there were Vietnam Vets, even after returning, when they happened to be in a tropical climate, similar to Vietnam, it could trigger flashbacks!
I didn't realize what a complex topic PTSD is! And what a challenge to any Psychiatrist!
I don't know a lot about PTSD specifically, but the older I get, the more I think a huge percentage of people suffer from some kind of trauma (without even realizing it). The history of humanity is a history of trauma and abuse.
I don't know a lot about PTSD specifically, but the older I get, the more I think a huge percentage of people suffer from some kind of trauma (without even realizing it). The history of humanity is a history of trauma and abuse.
The diagnostic criteria for PTSD and stressor-related disorders was significantly reworked for the current edition of the DSM. It is absolutely found in significant numbers in combat veterans (or anybody who experiences war, military or civilian), but is certainly not limited to those individuals.
But the DSM-5 also narrows diagnostic criteria to define specific types of events as "traumatic," versus stressors. Everything bad that a person may experince, which may leave the person feeling traumatized, is still only considered "trauma," by diagnostic standards if it falls within specific parameters. While a divorce, for instance, may feel traumatic, it wouldn't necessarily meet the DSM-5 criteria for classification and diagnosis.
The following are triggers for post-traumatic stress disorder,, as defined by the DSM-5:
Exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury or sexual violation. The exposure must result from one or more of the following scenarios, in which the individual:
• directly experiences the traumatic event;
• witnesses the traumatic event in person;
• learns that the traumatic event occurred to a close family member or close friend (with the actual
or threatened death being either violent or accidental); or
• experiences first-hand repeated or extreme exposure to aversive details of the traumatic event (not
through media, pictures, television or movies unless work-related).
The disturbance, regardless of its trigger, causes clinically significant distress or impairment in the indi-
vidual’s social interactions, capacity to work or other important areas of functioning. It is not the physi-
ological result of another medical condition, medication, drugs or alcohol.
Location: Huntersville/Charlotte, NC and Washington, DC
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Originally Posted by tijlover
Reading a book on Vietnam, Long Time Passing/Vietnam & The Haunted Generation, there's a chapter on PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and I'm learning now that PTSD can happen to just about anyone, who's not been traumatized in the military. Where have I been? Not knowing that?
Being in a natural disaster, or car accident, can cause it as well! In the book it points out a disastrous flood in West Virginia, in 1972, where a dam broke loose, with mining refuge, which flooded some towns in a valley. 10 years later, there were people, when it rained, they grabbed their car keys and fled, until it was over!
Yes, I can see, if my trailer was blown away by a tornado in Oklahoma, and me with it, (yes, you can be airlifted and deposited miles away!) my sleep might be interrupted for weeks, months afterwards!
Most shocking, is finding out about delayed reactions, which can occur 5-10-15-20 years afterwards!
So I'm wondering what else can cause PTSD? And how many have been misdiagnosed as a result of it?
Interesting, that there were Vietnam Vets, even after returning, when they happened to be in a tropical climate, similar to Vietnam, it could trigger flashbacks!
I didn't realize what a complex topic PTSD is! And what a challenge to any Psychiatrist!
I think I may have dealt with PTSD at some time in my life when I was young. Two very dramatic events that triggered the effects of PTSD for me (both happened within one year) were when a funnel cloud/tornado was heading for a building I was in and when my mother's ex-husband threatened suicide and then chased us in a car chase until he backed off. I was forced to get conseuling to deal with both events after I got suspended from school when some kids teased me about being scared of tornadoes and I fought them.
On this chapter on PTSD, it went on to how PTSD was treated, going back as far as WWI (actually PTSD has been around for centuries) and back then they used shock treatments. One man was so traumatized in battle in WWI he came back mute. Not knowing enough about how to treat these traumatized people, they incorporated shock treatments, which really wasn't much help.
Right up until the 70's/80's, psychiatrists still didn't know much about this condition, and they kept trying to blame it on their childhood upbringing, particularly with the Vietnam Vets, which made it very difficult to get on disability, or get the proper treatment they needed.
I would imagine that released prisoners can go through this as well, particularly if they went through a long confinement.
I think we've all had our close brushes with death in a car, and although more minor, the memories may still be there, at times.
Back in the late 60's, I was driving a 2-lane blacktop road, one night, with 4 of us in the car, and I came across an all-black car, with very little chrome, parked in the middle of the lane, and I missed hitting it by just a hair. Even to this day, I still cringe at the thought of it, and I still think of that, occasionally, even driving 2-lane roads at night!
PTSD is one of the more controversial diagnoses in the DSM, and has been as long as its been in various editions. That's one reason it's always getting revamped, to attempt to make the diagnostic criteria less subjective and more definitively measurable (or at least as definitively measurable as things that relate to mood and feeling, i.e. all of the DSM, can be).
It's also why the current definition relies more strongly on specific triggering causes than individually experienced feelings. Anytime anybody is in a stressful (even highly stressful!) situation, the result is not PTSD. The result of a highly stressful, but not lifethreatening, event may be something related to anxiety disorders (which PTSD was actually lumped in as a part of, under the old classification in the DSM-IV, versus part of its own family of disorders). But the new classification is more exact and specific. In order to be PTSD, the individual needs to have experienced actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violation, or have personally witnessed such things or had these things happen to someone to whom they are emotionally close, or be continually exposed to such things. Some instances where PTSD may develop:
-Among military members, both those who are injured in combat and those who witness death and injury of others in the course of combat, but are not themselves physically injured.
-Among civilians in war zones.
-Among law enforcement/firefighters, similar to above.
-Among first responders like EMTs, medical professionals in trauma units, etc. who are continuously exposed to death, serious injury, etc.
-Among those who witness a death or discover someone's body
-Among those who are sexually assaulted or witness sexual assault and/or molestation.
-Among those who are abused to the point of serious injury, or tortured.
-Among the family members of all of the above
-Among survivors of natural disasters, plane crashes, serious automobile accidents, serious train derailments, etc.
PTSD doesn't occur from being dumped, from experiencing a divorce, from having one's children taken away, from being verbally or emotionally abused, etc. Even a collision near-miss in a vehicle may not be sufficient for PTSD designation, since not all vehicle accidents are to a fatal level of seriousness. However, people will present with these things sure that they have PTSD. They clearly have emotional fallout, and may suffer from a variety of anxiety symptoms and potential anxiety disorders or mood disorders following such experiences, but the PTSD definition applies only to experiences of death or near-miss death/severe injury/sexual violation.
I think horrific accident traumatic experiences or surviving some calamity can cause PTSD or symptoms like PTSD. Anxiety, fear etc or some manifestation of recurring that trauma. Granted a lot depends on the mental toughness of the person and how they deal with experiences. Some deal with stuff better than others some just shut down others just cope and live in a fugue state.
I spent 10 years working for the largest Ambulance service in Canada, from 1977 to 1987.
Ten years was about all I could take. My back and shoulders were injured a number of times while carrying patients down stairs, or while trying to get into a crushed car at an accident scene.
It was not until I attended a reunion of retired co-workers that I began to connect some of my personal problems to my previous employment. In conversation with two of them, I heard both of them talking about the nightmares and the amount of stress that they still felt in certain situations. My ex partner, who I worked with for 8 years......had killed himself four years after I left the job. I didn't find out until I attended the re-union .
That information about my ex partner's death got me thinking about how many other of my former work mates had done the same thing ? I contacted the union that represents the city workers including the Ambulance attendants. They were able to tell me that in a 10 year period, the number of Ambulance workers, both current and retired, who took their own lives was 89. They couldn't tell me names, as that is protected by the Privacy Act here in Canada, but the number was accurate. That shocked me.
Some of the people that I worked with were what I call " those who want to save the world " and others were like me ...........strictly there for the money. I had a ritual that involved changing my uniform, at the end of each shift, and putting on my own clothes. It was my way of "leaving it at work ". I never turned down over time, and as I was a single man, I would do shift changes with others who were scheduled to work on Christmas Day, or New Year's Day. Working on a stat holiday was lucrative, as we worked a 12 hour shift normally, so a 12 hour holiday shift at double time and a half was worth 30 hours pay. My first pay cheque in the new year, was delivered by a Brink's truck........just kidding!
But as much as I liked the money, and the days off ( we only worked 20 days out of every 42 days ) I was being slowly eaten by the stress.
Now, almost 30 years after I left that job, I am convinced that it has left me with a lot of problems.
Jim B.
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