Posttraumatic Stress Disorder -A Condition That Keeps Reverberating

As someone who has struggled with PTSD for over two decades, I shudder to think about the immensity of trauma that is being inflicted around the world today. My personal experience, though in no way as severe and dangerous as the realities that are being played out daily, leads me to empathize with the victims, who suddenly awaken to a reality that they have no control over.

Both unethical and immoral, war is the worst possible way that humans relate to each other. The horrors that war generates greatly outweigh any imagined benefits. To continue to respond to the world with violence is not only criminal, it guarantees the perpetuation of more violence. Are we prepared to care for the living victims of this atrocity? While there has been discussion about the troops returning with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, the media ignores what they leave behind – the loss of Iraqi lives and the condition of the civilian victims that live with these losses.

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder was called “shell shock” before the Vietnam War. Since then, much research has been conducted regarding the effects of trauma on victims. PTSD is a label for the symptoms caused by traumatic experiences of all types including combat, torture, natural disaster, accidents and crimes(National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder).1 According to the National Center for PTSD “anyone who has gone through a life-threatening event can develop PTSD.” The soldiers returning from Iraq represent just one side of the trauma. We rarely hear about the condition of the illegally held victims of the US government in places such as Abu Ghraib and Guantanemo or about the Iraqi civilians that have lost their peace of mind along with the loss of family, friends, homes and neighborhoods. How these effects will manifest remains to be seen.

Trauma creates a physiological loop that is easily triggered. In mammals, when a traumatic event occurs, chemicals rush through the body causing dissociation, a numbing distancing from the body . This makes dying less painful- an out of body experience. If an animal escapes it’s predicament, it runs away, shakes itself to release the excess chemicals and goes on with it’s life. With human animals, the chemicals that cause dissociation sometimes continue to be released by the body. The body gets stuck in a state of fright without the benefit of flight. Caught in this state of victimization, many traumatized people have a hard time trusting their environment. The four types of symptoms include hyper vigilance, re-experiencing, avoidance and numbing (Friedman). 2

In “Wrong Place, Wrong Time- Civilian Victims of PTSD”, the authors, C.F. and D.R. bring to light some staggering consequences of this war on civilian populations. According to Ahmed Al Rawi, a Red Cross worker in Baghdad, who they interview, PTSD cannot even be addressed there. There is not enough medical help to deal with the enormity of the situation. Iraq has only 75 psychiatrists that continue to live and work there(19). 3 How will these wounds heal with so little support? From my perspective, the future looks mighty bleak.

1 National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder updated November 30, 2007. United States Department of Veterans Affairs,  accessed September 30, 2007
<http://www.ncptsd.va.gov/ncmain/ncdocs/fact_shts/fs_what_is_ptsd.html&gt;

2 Friedman, Matthew J.  M.D., Ph.D.,” Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Among Military Returnees From Afghanistan and Iraq “, Am J Psychiatry 163:4, April 2006 accessed September 30, 2007
<http://www.ncptsd.va.gov/ncmain/nc_archives/nc_artics/id28413.pdf&gt;

3 C.F and D.R. “WRONG PLACE, WRONG TIME CIVILIAN VICTIMS OF PTSD.” Registered Nurse: Journal of Patient Advocacy; Vol. 102 Issue 8 (Oct2006) : p19-19 Academic Search Premier, Ebscohost. Empire State College,NYC. Septeber 30, 2007
<http://library.esc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=23250689&site=ehost-live&gt;