You CAN Manage Stress!

PTSD—A Normal Reaction to an Abnormal Experience

'Three months after our car smashup, I still couldn't stop crying, or sleep through the night. Just leaving the house was terrifying.'—Louise.

LOUISE suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a debilitating malady characterized by recurring and intrusive recollections or dreams of a traumatic event. The person with PTSD may also have an exaggerated startle response. For example, mental-health expert Michael Davis tells of one Vietnam veteran who on the day of his wedding dived into the bushes at the sound of a car backfiring. "There should have been all kinds of signals in the environment that told him everything was okay," says Davis. "It was 25 years later; he was in the United States, not Vietnam; . . . he was wearing a white tuxedo, not battle fatigues. But when that primordial stimulus came through, he ran for cover."

Battlefield trauma is just one cause of PTSD. According to The Harvard Mental Health Letter, the disorder can result from any "event or series of events that involves actual or threatened death or serious injury or a threat to physical integrity. It might be a natural disaster, accident, or human action: flood, fire, earthquake, car crash, bombing, shooting, torture, kidnapping, assault, rape, or child abuse." Simply witnessing a traumatic event or learning about it—perhaps through striking testimony or photographs—may induce symptoms of PTSD, especially if the people involved are family members or close friends.

Of course, people respond to trauma differently. "Most people who undergo a traumatic experience do not develop serious psychiatric symptoms, and even when there are symptoms, they do not necessarily take the form of PTSD," explains The Harvard Mental Health Letter. What about those whose stress does lead to PTSD? In time, some are able to handle the feelings associated with the trauma and gain relief. Others continue to wrestle with memories of a traumatic event many years after it occurred.

Either way, those who suffer from PTSD—and those who want to help them—should remember that recovery requires patience. The Bible exhorts Christians to "speak consolingly to the depressed souls" and to "be long-suffering toward all." (1 Thessalonians 5:14) For Louise, quoted at the outset, five months elapsed before she could once again get behind the steering wheel of a car. "Despite the strides I've made," she stated four years after the accident, "driving will never be the pleasant experience it once was for me. It's something I must do, so I do it. But I've come a long way since the helpless time following the accident."

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