Trauma

What is trauma?

In psychiatry and psychology, the term trauma is used when someone remains stuck in feelings of fear, anger, or loneliness after a shocking event. In that case, the event is so unusual, painful, shocking, or extreme that they are unable to cope with it.

Symptoms

For most people, the symptoms resulting from the unpleasant event will significantly decrease within a few weeks. We do not call this a trauma. We only speak of a trauma or ‘traumatic event’ if the symptoms persist or worsen after four weeks.

The complaints or problems that people with trauma may suffer from are diverse in nature, but often relate to sadness, anxiety, and mistrust. In some disorders such as depression or bipolar disorder There may be a history of trauma.

Treatment

When mood episodes continue to occur despite the use of medication, it may be helpful to treat the past trauma.

Trauma can often be effectively treated with forms of therapy based on cognitive behavioral therapy. An example of this is Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). EMDR is a short-term, protocol-based form of therapy in which the traumatic memory is retrieved step-by-step under the guidance of the therapist. Simultaneously, the therapist provides a distraction, namely hand movements that must be followed with the eyes. The combination of retrieving the memory and the distracting eye movements ensures that the memory is stored in the memory with less emotional intensity.

Resilience

Most people respond resiliently to stressful events. Although an event is short-lived stress can provide a response, allowing someone to quickly regain balance. As a result, most people continue to function well, despite experiencing stressful events. Severe or prolonged stress can lead to a decrease in resilience, like an elastic band that has lost its stretch. When there is little resilience, a stressful event can trigger the development of psychological symptoms. Trauma can result in long-term impairment of resilience. People then remain vulnerable to developing psychological problems for their entire lives.

At the UMC Utrecht

More information

Also read...

• Stress
• Bipolar disorder
• Depression
• Psychosis
• SAM study: research into childhood trauma and depression
  

Marco Boks about DNA adjustment after trauma

Marco Boks over aanpassing DNA na trauma

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Link to Marco Boks about DNA modification after trauma

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