Featuring a guest blogger: Tara Cantrell, and EMDR trauma therapist from Charlotte NC! Check out her website for more information about her practice.

 

As someone who works with individuals who have faced a lot of trauma in their lives, one question I get asked a lot is, “Will I ever heal from what has happened or will I have PTSD forever?”

People are often surprised when my answer is “You can heal. You can heal faster than you think, and you might even experience growth after you’ve healed.”

 

If you’re experiencing trauma symptoms or PTSD symptoms, you may have an eyebrow raised at that answer. It may be a challenge,while experiencing the horrors that often follow a traumatic event (nightmares, flashbacks, fear and hypervigilance, etc..), to imagine life without those symptoms. To imagine anything more than symptom management may feel completely impossible. Yet, research shows that there is hope for your recovery.

 

You CAN recover from Trauma

 

It’s estimated that around 70% of the population have experienced a traumatic event at some point in their lives. Temporary traumatic reactions (like the ones listed above, for example), are a normal human response to experiencing an event that overwhelms our ability to cope. For many people, with time and safety, these symptoms will resolve on their own.

 

However, approximately 20% of those who have experienced trauma will go on to develop PTSD. Essentially, that means that those initial trauma reactions get stuck and the individual, with time, does not improve on their own. Once an individual develops PTSD, the trauma symptoms are unlikely to resolve without help.

 

Researchers have speculated why some individuals develop PTSD and others do not. No single theory has been chosen as the “correct answer” but one of the leading thoughts is that the more we try to avoid thinking about what happened or try to deny the experience of our emotions, the more likely we are to develop PTSD.

 

It’s counter-intuitive if you think about it. As a child, if you burned your hand on the stove, you learned to avoid putting your hand on the stove, right? It makes sense that our initial reaction to trauma is to avoid the distress. Unfortunately, our minds don’t cooperate with that logic. In fact, it’s the opposite: the more we try to avoid thinking and feeling, the more likely those thoughts and emotions are going to disturb us and continue causing distress.

 

You have treatment options

 

When you decide you are ready to face what has happened, you’ve got some options. Currently, the US recommends 3 treatments as “evidence based practices” for the treatment of PTSD. They include Prolonged Exposure (PE), Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT), and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). These have been extensively studied and have the evidence to prove they effectively treat PTSD.

People are often terrified that PTSD means that they will spend a lifetime in therapy just to maintain, but each of these therapies are shorter than you might think. The average number of sessions needed for someone to no longer meet the criteria for PTSD vary person to person. The average number of sessions needed are below:

 

EMDR: 8 sessions

CPT: 12 sessions

PE: 8-15 sessions

 

I hope by now you are starting to have hope that there is life after a traumatic event, even if you’ve developed PTSD. Now, as to my other claim….

 

You can experience GROWTH after trauma

 

Researchers Richard Tedeschi, PhD, and Lawrence Calhoun, PhD coined the term “Posttraumatic Growth”  in the 1990’s to describe patients who, following the resolution of a trauma, later experienced a better quality of life in specific areas. Many who have overcome their past have reported what I like to call “growth gains” after they’ve healed. Most commonly, people reported that they “develop[ed] new understandings of themselves, the world they live in, how to relate to other people, the kind of future they might have and a better understanding of how to live life,” Tedeschi said.

 

It’s estimated that around a half to two thirds of individuals will report the experience of posttraumatic growth (PTG). This has led to research looking at why some experience PTG and others don’t.

 

Being an EMDR therapist, one study I found particularly interesting was the correlation between receiving EMDR therapy and an increased likelihood of experiencing posttraumatic growth after treatment. More research needs to be done for us to have a more conclusive understanding of posttraumatic growth and the connection between trauma therapies and the likelihood of PTG, but early studies are showing exciting and promising results.

 

As always, if you have questions or comments, find me at www.taracantrell.com.

 

Wishing you health, healing, and joy,

 

Tara Cantrell

Charlotte Trauma Therapist

 

*Note: A summary of the study cited can be found here: http://www.cpn.or.kr/journal/view.html?uid=597&vmd=Full&