PTSD treatment so you can stop reliving it.
Are You Struggling With PTSD Symptoms?
Always On Guard
You may be living in a state of being constantly “on guard,” always feeling like something bad is about to happen (again). You might feel jumpy, make mental notes of your exits, scan surroundings for potential weapons or signs of danger. In short, you’re waiting - and your body says “this time I’ll see it coming so I can stop it.”
Intrusive Memories
You may have nightmares or suddenly feel like it’s happening all over again. You might be going about your day, playing with your kids or grocery shopping, when a random image from your own trauma suddenly pops up. You might try to play it off, to keep anyone from seeing you’ve “gone away,” but it’s hard to put the images away in your mind.
Disconnected from Life
Your life is suddenly divided into chapters - before it happened, and after. You have a knowing sense nothing will ever be or feel the same again. You look at other people going about their normal lives like everything is fine. You may feel more and more distant from them - like they don’t get it, they never could, and you’re not sure you want them to.
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The Crisis Lifeline offers free, confidential support 24/7. You do NOT have to be actively suicidal to reach out for help. If it’s 2am and you just need someone to sit with you while you cry or just listen and not say the wrong thing - give them a call. Just let them know you need someone to talk to.
Top 5 Myths of PTSD
Most people with PTSD come up with the same strategies to try and manage it. Here’s a breakdown of some of the most common tactics, (along with explanations for why these don’t work long-term).
If you’ve been relying on these rules for managing your ptsd you might have noticed that you get short-term relief. However, you may have also noticed that over the long-term your symptoms have only gotten worse. You may be feeling more on-edge, more disconnected, or having more suicidal thoughts than you did before.
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It’s natural to want to put the pain behind you. However, trying to move forward and forget about a traumatic experience can often leave your mind stuck in a loop.
After trauma, the mind will replay it often, trying to define what happened, how it happened, who’s fault it was, and how we can guarantee it will never happen again. This exhausting mental game often continues on a loop until a traumatic experience has been emotionally processed and integrated into the story of your life. Only then, can the mind “set it down.”
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By avoiding reminders, you give those people, places, objects, and situations a great deal of power. In other words, this avoidance only makes you more afraid. This combination of fear and “high alert” can keep PTSD symptoms going.
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Drinking and smoking may take the edge off and help you escape your body or mind temporarily, but this only prolongs your symptoms. In order for PTSD symptoms to resolve, treatment should involve working with tiny pieces of the experience, one at a time, to help avoid overwhelming you.
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Your body will stay on “high alert” all on it’s own, which can settle over time. With PTSD however, this is often coupled with the way you talk to yourself about how you should have seen something coming, should have known what would happen, or should have done something sooner to stop it. It’s this combination of “high alert” and the language of self-blame that is particularly damaging with PTSD.
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In an effort to stay safe after a traumatic experience, trust is suddenly very hard to come by. If you blame yourself for your trauma, you may have a hard time trusting yourself or your judgment - believing at any moment you’ll miss something crucial and lead yourself into harm’s way. Trauma can also profoundly affect our trust in humans as a whole or those who remind us of someone harmful (i.e. “All men are dangerous”)
While these rules are natural to develop after trauma, they are often extreme and rigid, meaning they are applied across the board. These types of rules often make us feel less and less safe over time, leading to smaller and smaller lives in an effort to avoid danger.
How PTSD Treatment Can Help
When It’s Time to Call In the Pros
PTSD can affect major areas of your life - your relationships, work, finances, self-esteem, and even your physical health. Not everyone who experiences a trauma will develop PTSD. So how do you know when it’s time to reach out for help? If you notice ptsd symptoms such as nightmares, intrusive memories, increased anxiety, or feeling disconnected from lifehave been going on for a long time or if they’re negatively affecting major areas of your life, it’s time to reach out. Read on to learn more about how our team can help.
“92% of people who complete Cognitive Processing Therapy no longer meet criteria for a diagnosis of PTSD.”
Reconnect Your Relationships
After successfully completing ptsd treatment, our clients report feeling less angry, disconnected, and on-edge with those closest to them. As you work through anger about what happened to you, there’s often more bandwidth to handle day-to-day frustrations with greater self-control.
Our clients who successfully complete ptsd treatment also report feeling more aware of their physical and emotional boundaries in relationships. This often leads clients to establishing more feelings of safety in relationships by openly communicating what they need.
Unravel Shame and Self-Blame
Many of our clients who successfully complete ptsd treatment report feeling less guilt and self-blame for not predicting or preventing the trauma from happening. This shift can have positive and profound effects on self-esteem for clients who have been feeling stuck..
Additionally, our clients report feeling less ashamed of their trauma after processing the experience in a safe space. PTSD treatment often focuses on working through these elements of trauma first, so that you can begin to uncover healthy feelings of anger and grief that will allow you to move through the experience.
Reduce or Eliminate Suicidal Thoughts
Trauma can leave you feeling disconnected from life, which can lead to suicidal thoughts for some people. PTSD treatment can help to decrease feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, and shame that often lead to suicidal thoughts. We have clients who report they are beginning to feel the capacity for joy and connection - something they thought was lost forever.
Find Meaning Again
Our clients often report a greater sense of connection to the world around them and life as a whole after completing trauma therapy. Because trauma often requires us to “disconnect” in order to emotionally survive, there is a slow process of reconnecting with your body, your emotions, and your life again that is a crucial element of healing. PTSD treatment takes this process slowly so as not to overwhelm you and our clients often remark this process is what allowed them to find meaning and purpose again.
Ready to Get Started?
Get In Touch With Us
Perhaps one of the hardest steps you’ll have to make by yourself is the first step of reaching out to us. Send us your info and we’ll take it from there, supporting you each step of the way.
Complete a Free Consult
You might be nervous about making phone calls or not sure what to say - either way we’ll walk you through it step-by-step in about 15 minutes. We like to be sure it’s a good fit first.
Have Your First Session
We’ll set up your first session with your therapist to complete your initial assessment. This helps to ensure we have a solid game plan from the get-go so you can feel confident in the process.
References:
Galovski, T. E., Blain, L. M., Mott, J. M., Elwood, L., & Houle, T. (2012). Manualized therapy for PTSD: Flexing the structure of Cognitive Processing Therapy. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 80(6), 968-981. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0030600