Since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic in 2020, we have seen how our communities come together, how we support one another, and how selfless we can be during such a hard time. We’ve also seen how difficult this time has been on our mental health. While most people experience symptoms like PTSD after the traumatic event and heal on their own after a while, some get stuck and cannot get past their trauma. If you have PTSD, the sooner you seek treatment, the more likely you can prevent it from getting worse.
How To Know If You Have PTSD?
PTSD develops immediately after experiencing a traumatic event. Sometimes they can take a few weeks or months to appear. Many people will feel a profound sense of anxiety and being constantly in danger, sudden mood changes, and loss of interest in activities they previously enjoyed. They are also likely to re-experience the traumatic events through flashbacks or nightmares. It is also common for people experiencing trauma-related symptoms to have sleeping challenging’s such as insomnia and generalized anxiety and depression symptoms. Increased arousal, such as trouble sleeping, is also a good symptom of PTSD.
Consequences Of Having PTSD
PTSD is often related to profound changes in the autonomic nervous system, particularly a deficiency in the parasympathetic nervous system and an increase in sympathetic nervous system activity. PTSD is also associated with excessive activity in the brain networks related to negative emotional responses and processing threat-detection, decreased activity in the networks involved in emotional regulation and executive control, and deficiencies in brain circuits involved in reward.
PTSD can last for many years if left untreated, and it can get worse rather than better over time. PTSD can be associated with substantial disruption and distress of social, school, house, and occupational functions, causing significant problems in jobs, families, studies, and relationships.
Treatment Of PTSD
There is an effective treatment if PTSD affects you or someone you love after the COVID-19 pandemic. The first step is to have a psychiatric evaluation, which would confirm the PTSD diagnosis or rule out the diagnosis in other cases. If a PTSD diagnosis is confirmed, several treatments and therapies are available. These include psychiatric medications (including prazosin and SSRI antidepressants for nightmares) and forms of cognitive-behavioral psychotherapy involving “ mental and emotional processing” of the trauma: prolonged exposure therapy, reprogramming (EMDR), eye-movement desensitization, and trauma-focused CBT.
Other forms of psychotherapy that don’t involve direct trauma processing can also be helpful, such as interpersonal therapy (IPT), cognitive processing therapy (CPT-C), mindfulness-based therapy, and present-centered therapy (PCT).
Covid PTSD Treatment In Agoura Hills
Here at Awakenings Treatment Center, we know how PTSD can affect your life. Our goal is to offer unique treatment paths that will help you feel supported and prepared to face the ups and downs that COVID-19 and any other unexpected challenges can bring.
For more information about our covid PTSD treatment in Agoura Hills, please call us at 855-717-3268 for help.