If you read the article about PTSD on the Smithsonian you may think it is true when the headline announced this.“9/11 Changed How Doctors Treat PTSD”
Before September 11, 2001, many people thought of trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)—if they thought of them at all—as things that happened to soldiers in faraway war zones.
But after the entire nation watched the Twin Towers crumble on television, it became clear that trauma could hit much closer to home. And you didn’t need to be physically involved to feel the effects, either.
You’d believe it unless you were already aware of what had been going on for decades. I got into this work in 1982. At the time, research was more focused on Vietnam veterans, and rightly so. Because that generation of veterans fought for the funding and research on trauma, we ended up with mental health professionals, trauma specialists, veterans centers and support groups. How survivors were responded to happened because of that researches learned from veterans.
So why is it that reporters, even from very notable publications get it wrong? Simple, they went with what was “commonly known” instead of what was happening in survivors all over the world. Survivors like me. All 9/11 did was change how reporters cover PTSD.
When the American Psychiatric Association developed the category of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in the DSM-III, the validity of stress related problems reported by Vietnam veterans became widely recognized. It may be viewed that the problems often reported by Vietnam veterans prior to the
The following is from a thesis paper written in 1986.
“Many citizen, including mental health professionals now have regrets, specifically about hostile attitudes and non therapeutic receptions which some returning veterans encountered.”
Bari S. Fisher
That was only part of the research being done that led to everything available to all survivors. Treatment is vital and treatment works!
In 1981, I saw a trauma specialist working with crime victims after my ex-husband tired to kill me. In 1990, my husband, a Vietnam veteran was diagnosed with PTSD by a trauma specialist and then in 1993 by the Department of Veterans Affairs. In 1998, again I saw a trauma specialist after the stress of living with PTSD, surviving many events, and the frustration of years of helping other people, became to much and I needed help.
Yet, with all I knew, it was not until last year, I understood I had a rare form of PTSD. I had survived over 10 events, beginning at the age of 5. What I had left was all centered around my ex-husband and once I read his obituary notice, all the nightmares, flashbacks, mood-swings and panic attacks stopped. Why? Because with decades of research, I never read anything about people like me.
Until reporters actually begin to report on facts, instead of making assumptions, we will never become aware of what we need to know. First and foremost is the fact that we can heal. We can reverse a lot of what PTSD does and what we cannot reverse, there are coping tools to help us get through the hard times. We learn there is nothing to be ashamed of as survivors of the cause. We learn that people who have not survived events that could have killed them, will never fully understand us. We also learn to communicate with them in terms they can understand and help them to be able to help support us.
There is so much hope out there, but we shouldn’t have to search through nonsense to find it. The power in within all of us as we get to define the rest of our lives even though we had no control over what was done to us.
Remember, it’s your life…get in and drive it!
#BreakTheSilence and #TakeBackYourLife from #PTSD
