Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a disorder of not being able to recover after experiencing or seeing something terrifying. According to PTSDUK, one in ten people have PTSD along with one in five firefighters, 70% of rape victims, one in three teens who have been in a car crash, and 40% who have dealt with sudden loss. You can either feel your life is in danger, threatened, or you have seen someone else dying or being injured. Having PTSD is about not having control over your thoughts as every day feels like the nightmare you have been trying to avoid since your first encounter.
According to The Mighty, people described their feelings of PTSD as having smells, looks, vibes, dreams, or how someone treats you as a trigger from the experience you wish you could forget. It feels like you are constantly on alert the way you feel when you watch a scary movie but you feel that way everyday. Someone also described PTSD as putting items like dissociative episodes, panic attacks, flashbacks, unwelcomed thoughts, anxiety, and depression in a closet until there is no more. Once the closet is full, all of the items burst out and you do not know what to do with all of your cluttering items all around you. Treatment is about learning how to deal with those items and finding a better place for them.
It feels scary being alive when you are constantly on alert. Everyday feels like you are gonna die where you cannot sleep because you are afraid of what dreams you will have. You are afraid of the sound of every car door, loud bangs, someone’s footsteps, when someone calls your name in the distance, and feel like someone is hiding behind you. Flashes of memories consume your daily life. You feel like there is a monster hiding under your bed but you are the only one who can see this monster.
Your survival instincts are always running and you tend to react without thinking. Your anger takes over when the stress hits and it bypasses your rational way of thinking. You feel guilty for not being able to control yourself or always being afraid of things that other people are able to walk away from. All the more reason why people with PTSD need to get help immediately before they hurt themselves or hurt others from their inescapable pain.
Smarmore Castle Private Clinic in County Louth, near Dublin was founded in 1988 as a residential rehabilitation hospital treating people suffering from drug and alcohol purposes. Smarmore Castle offers patients therapies are tailored into a personalised treatment programme that suits the needs of the individual such as trauma (PTSD). For more information, please call 041-214-5111. For those who live out of the country, the international number is 00353-41-214-5111.
