Is PTSD Preventable? - Page 8

Dylan · #71 11-07-2008, 08:58 AM

I voted "yes".

With single-incident trauma I think immediate counseling/therapy with someone skilled in trauma recovery could very
well avoid the development of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Maybe not post traumatic stress; in the literature I've read, the majority of those who undergo a traumatic experience will have PTS immediately following the incident. I don't think it is inevitable that with trauma comes the disorder.

Isn't it true that sometimes, in the wake of natural disasters, PTSD can be avoided if the response of the community, family, and professional community is strong, empathic and supportive? I do think the external responses can have a definite impact on whether or not PTSD develops.

Now, with chronic and/or repeated trauma, that gets more difficult because at what point would the person be given help? First time? Mid-way? When they can get away (in the case of torture, kidnap, incest/child abuse)?

-Dylan

FlameTachiku · #72 13-07-2008, 05:05 AM

I voted NO!

It would not have changed what was experienced in the moment.

Having zero control and zero ability to change the outcome of that experience, is not supported by FORCED anything, especially while tramatized!

For me it would have added to the trauma. But having it aviliable, affordable, access to....given free choice, it likely would minamize the trauma, increase quality of life, and bring down cost to society(as our actions, or lack of actions, always effect others).

Tachiku

bustedflat · #73 13-07-2008, 07:28 AM

I did not start experiencing symptoms until several months afterward. I was in shock and angry long before I asked for help.

redtriskell · #74 19-07-2008, 04:02 PM

This is a tough one. I think the key phrase in the query is "forced". At the time my father died, which presumably would have been the best time to begin therapy, I was so crazy-angry-hostile to any adult who claimed they wanted to "help" me (really? then why didn't you?) that therapy would have been utterly pointless. And I was nowhere near ready or able to say out loud the things I had experienced. Not to mention that I didn't even know at the time that I had a dissociative problem so I was missing enormous chunks of time. Besides, I think I already had ptsd by the time he died. The only prevention I could have had was for my mother not to put me in his hands. I believe everyone has to come to realization and then choice in their own time. For the same reason you shouldn't force a flower bud open, we (society) shouldn't try to force therapy on people. All you'd end up with is dead flower buds and even crazier people. Only my opinion. red