PTSD in children and its effect. Causes of PTSD. Research Paper

PTSD in Children and Its Effect
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PTSD in Children and Its Effect
Introduction
Most people react with feelings of fear or sadness when faced with traumatic situations. Usually, there are a number of people that develop PTSD after undergoing a terrifying event. The people who develop PTSD continue experiencing fear and worry after the event has already passed. The natural reaction of the body when faced with danger is fear. The body either gets ready to defend itself from the danger or to flee. Fight or flight response is a normal physical reaction. However, for people struggling with PTSD, the fight or flight response is somehow damaged or changed. That is why they feel frightened and stressed even when they are not in danger. PTSD is a mental health problem that can affect people at any age. A person can experience persistent memories of an ordeal that happened. In other cases, the traumatic events can take a period of over six months without manifestation. However, when PTSD occurs before long after an event, the condition improves after a period of three months. Some people suffering from PTSD experience long term effects and feel emotionally and chronically numb. A child suffering from PTSD tends to experience persistent and scary thoughts of past memories. In children, PTSD becomes a chronic disorder. The essay discusses PTSD in children and its effects.
Causes of PTSD
There are several factors that cause PTSD in a child. PTSD can be triggered by events that happened in the life of a child. The event can happen to the child, someone close to the child or something the child saw (Sonis, 2012).Incidents such as bad accidents, critical medical procedures or animal bites are some of the causes of PTSD. Tragedies such as bomb blasts, sexual assault and emotional abuse can also cause PTSD in both children and teenagers. To add on, violent personal attacks like kidnapping or torture can trigger anxiety and depression and eventually lead to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Children at Risk of Getting PTSD (Risk and Resiliency Factors)
All children are at risk of suffering from PTSD. However, there are certain factors that can determine whether a child is likely to suffer from PTSD. For example, how bad the event was and the ability of the child to recover from difficult moments in their lives means a lot. Family support is also important in reducing the risk of getting PTSD (Sandica, 2014).In most cases, the number of times the tragic event has happened determines a lot. For instance, if sexual assault has happened more than once, it might be hard for a child to recover from the situation. This is because they keep anticipating of the same to happen every day.
Risk factors increase the prospects of a person suffering from PTSD. On the other hand, resiliency factors reduce the threat of developing the disorder. Both risk and resiliency factors play a role in the development of PTSD. Some of the risk factors include the family history on mental illnesses and exposure to extreme violence (Sandica, 2014).Neglect and experiencing the death of someone who met their emotional needs can trigger PTSD. Children rely on adults to provide for their needs. These resources develop the resiliency factors. Children who have parents who keep them safe and help them deal with traumatizing situations can help reduce the risk of getting PTSD. Children also need to be taught how to deal with traumatic events in addition to being removed from situations that can cause or add trauma.
Symptoms
The symptoms of PTSD are likely to show immediately after a stressful event. In most cases, the symptoms do not even show for a period of six months or longer. PTSD may be caused by anxiety, substance abuse or depression. Children suffering from PTSD experience emotional and physical distress every time they are exposed of the situations that remind them of the traumatic situations they underwent. Some children tend to relive the traumatising events over and over. These events may be accompanied by nightmares and unsettling memories during day time. Children suffering from PTSD tend to feel depressed most times and experience difficulties when it comes to sleeping.
Also, they are always on guard and show a more aggressive and violent behaviour. In other cases, the children seem to lose interest in activities they used to enjoy before. They detach from everyone else and face difficulties showing affection to others. Children with PTSD always avoid places that may remind them of what happened to them. In school, they have trouble concentrating and end up in trouble in most occasions. There are other children who act younger than their age by wetting the bed or sucking their thumbs. At times, physical symptoms such as stomach ache and headaches may be present.
Diagnosis of PTSD in Children
Many people assume that all the children who have undergone stressful events suffer from PTSD. This, however, is not the case. Diagnosis of PTSD happens only when the symptoms have been showing for more than a month and are affecting the normal functioning of a child in a negative way. Symptoms for those suffering from PTSD start three months after the happening of a traumatic event. In most cases, the symptoms can show after months and can even take years. A mental health evaluation is carried out by a psychiatrist who specializes in children.
Treatment of PTSD
Treatment of PTSD is highly dependent on the age of a child; the symptoms and the general hea...