Psychologists define trauma on two parameters. Firstly, this is an event that is different from daily life events and experiences. Secondly, this is the event that has the potential to induce distress in almost all people.
Traumas main include severe accidents, exposure to death and injury, wars etc. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is the long term after effect of any traumatic situation. Traumas may also produce short term effects. These short-term after effects constitute a separate entity of acute traumatic stress disorder. PTSD develops from those traumatic events in which people face threats to physical security, and they are exposed to serious injury or death.
Till now, we have talked about the effects of threatening events and their resulting disorder. Now, I will explain how a person feels while he is suffering from traumatic effects. There are various symptoms that appear in an individual during the course of the disorder. When a person faces an incident with an exposure to death, the very first feeling that appears in an individual is that of helplessness. An adult or child may feel horror. This horror may express itself in the form of aggressive behavior. People may become aggressive after traumatic events when they think about their lack of control over the situation. There are some other symptoms that appear among individuals after exposure to a trauma. There are three other symptoms:
1) Re-experiencing the traumatic events. These are the symptoms in which a person re-experiences the traumatic event through recollections related to that event, distressing dreams, acting as the event is happening again and physiological arousal to reminders of the event.
2) Avoidance of trauma related stimuli. These symptoms appear when an individual tries to avoid all the things that remind him of the particular event. The person starts avoiding the thoughts and activities that remind him of the traumatic event. Moreover, an individual may become aloof, and may not take part in the activities which were pleasurable for him before the event.
3) Symptoms of increased arousal. An individual, who has experienced a traumatic event, may feel aroused that is, he feel difficulty in falling asleep, irritation and aggression, lack of concentration and hypervigilance.
Diagnosis of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder will be given when an individual will experience these symptoms for more than one month, and these symptoms will create disturbances in normal functioning of the routine life. Sometimes, it happens that people do not meet the full criteria of the disorder, but still they feel distress that disturbs their daily functioning. Moreover, this disorder appears in combination with depression, generalized anxiety and stress after traumatic events. It is also important point that exposure of traumatic events through media and even listening about traumatic events can produce stressful reactions in an individuals. But in such cases, traumatic events have a lot of potential to induce distress in their listeners.
If there will be more exposure of individuals to local riots, internal armed conflicts and war, then there will be higher prevalence rates of the disorder in that country. During natural disasters, youngsters are automatically exposed to threatening conditions, but under normal circumstances, care must be taken to avoid children's exposure to news and magazines that contain dreadful pictures of the disasters. If we take care in case of children, we will be able to prevent them from post traumatic stress disorder.
