Overcoming emotional trauma requires effort, but there are multiple routes you can take. Often, doctors will prescribe medications that affect the neurotransmitters, serotonin or norepinephrine. This is to help balance these chemicals that occur naturally in the brain. Some different options of medication typically recommended for survivors are antidepressants, monoamine oxidase inhibitors, antipsychotics, beta-blockers, or benzodiazepines.
Depending on your trauma, your physician will recommend using medication and prescribe you which medication they believe will be best for you. Another common treatment to help survivors who are recovering from emotional trauma is therapy.
There are many different types of therapy, but the main goal is to change the thought process of the victim. This may involve talking, exercises, or other types of treatment. Our therapists and clinicians are experienced in PTSD and emotional trauma. They have specialized training and high-level expertise that allow them to customize trauma treatment options according to individuals. At Highland Springs Specialty Clinic, we combine cognitive behavioral therapy and desensitization therapy.
Our cognitive behavioral therapy helps our therapists and patients identify the root of the trauma and triggers that bring fear and agitation to the surface. Once these triggers are identified, the therapist and client work together to replace these emotions with more rational, neutral emotions and overcome emotional trauma.
Contact Us Today! Desensitization therapy will then help the client heal by verbalizing the trauma that occurred in the past.
This allows them to release emotions connected with the event and decrease flashbacks and other symptoms.
Desensitization is all about acceptance and moving on. The client will be able to leave their trauma in the past and learn to live a more healthy lifestyle free from PTSD symptoms. Whatever process you choose for overcoming your emotional trauma, the journey will take time and require work. The impact of these changes are especially exacerbated by three major brain function dysregulations: Overstimulated amygdala: An almond-shaped mass located deep in the brain, the amygdala is responsible for survival-related threat identification, plus tagging memories with emotion.
After trauma the amygdala can get caught up in a highly alert and activated loop during which it looks for and perceives threat everywhere. Underactive hippocampus: An increase in the stress hormone glucocorticoid kills cells in the hippocampus, which renders it less effective in making synaptic connections necessary for memory consolidation.
This interruption keeps both the body and mind stimulated in reactive mode as neither element receives the message that the threat has transformed into the past tense. The sympathetic nervous system remains highly activated leading to fatigue of the body and many of its systems, most notably the adrenal. How Healing Happens While changes to the brain can seem, on the surface, disastrous and representative of permanent damage, the truth is that all of these alterations can be reversed.
Share Tweet Share. Recommendations 5 Symptoms of Arthritis in the Knee. What is Post-Surgical Neuropathic Pain? Male Overactive Bladder. Adolescent Migraine. See all studies. One treatment option today that utilizes action to immobilize the body and brain is eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, or EMDR. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation to alternately engage both sides of the brain in action. This bilateral movement causes the traumatic memory that is looping in the emotional side of the brain to integrate with the cognitive part of the brain.
Sensorimotor techniques are also useful in limbic calming. It is a means of engaging the body and the mind in the recovery process. Through his neuro-imaging studies, Daniel Amen has documented that people experience calming in their limbic structures following EMDR treatment. Other venues for limbic calming include soothing music, prayer and meditation, mindful breathing, yoga, and exercise.
Take 5 minutes in the morning and evening to rock back and forth, or side to side, just noticing and relaxing the body. Practice deep breathing in sequences of three. For example, breathe, breathe, breathe.
Breathe, breathe, breathe. Participate in some form of exercise for minutes per day to increase serotonin and dopamine. Participate in minutes per day of prayer or meditation, as the spiritual center of the brain is an area that is able to influence and calm the deeper regions of the brain.
There are therapists who know how to help you out of the looping cycle of PTSD and into the circle of life. The physical scars heal, but some emotional wounds stop the lives of these people dead in their tracks. They are afraid to get close to people or form new relationships. Change terrifies them, and they remain forever hesitant to express their needs or desire to meet their creative potential.
It may not be always apparent, but post-traumatic stress disorder PTSD stifles the life force out of its victims. PTSD is painful and frightening. The memories of the event linger and victims often have vivid flashbacks. Frightened and traumatized, they are almost always on edge, and the slightest of cues sends them hurtling back inside their protective shells. Usually, victims try to avoid people, objects, and situations that remind them of their hurtful experiences—this behavior is debilitating and prevents them from living their lives meaningfully.
Many victims forget the details of the incident, presumably in an attempt to lessen the blow. But this coping mechanism has negative repercussions as well. Extensive neuroimaging studies on the brains of PTSD patients show that several regions differ structurally and functionally from those of healthy individuals.
The amygdala, the hippocampus, and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex play a role in triggering the typical symptoms of PTSD. These regions collectively impact the stress response mechanism in humans, so that the PTSD victim, even long after their experience, continues to perceive and respond to stress differently than someone who is not suffering the aftermath of trauma.
The most significant neurological impact of trauma is seen in the hippocampus. PTSD patients show a considerable reduction in the volume of the hippocampus. This region of the brain is responsible for memory functions. It helps an individual to record new memories and retrieve them later in response to specific and relevant environmental stimuli. The hippocampus also helps us distinguish between past and present memories.
PTSD patients with reduced hippocampal volume lose the ability to discriminate between past and present experiences or correctly interpret environmental contexts.
0コメント