...Traumatic experiences that cause severe emotional distress often transform a person’s “self.” Specifically, through traumatic experiences the self transforms by becoming less selfish and more reflective of their actions and their past. Human beings have both an absorbed self, the part of us that is primarily concerned with our own well being, and a reflective self, which is our ability to reflect on how our actions affect others. When we withstand a traumatic experience, parts of the absorbed self fades away, while the reflective self matures. We become less selfish and more compassionate towards others. Three literary works -- The Epic of Gilgamesh, Sophocles' Oedipus the King and Plato’s Phaedo, -- show this transformation of self. In The Epic Of Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh transforms himself from an unruly king who is unaware of his own death into a compassionate friend who reflects on the idea of his death. This transformation in self derives from the gods’ creation of Enkidu. Enkidu is created to match Gilgamesh. Before Gilgamesh meets Enkidu, he is characterized as a reckless leader, who “tramples his citizens like a wild bull ”(Mitchell 2004: 72). He neglects to think about his mortal side, and rules his people as if his days did not truly count. Once Enkidu comes into his life, Gilgamesh’s unjust actions stop. Although Gilgamesh is still stronger than Enkidu, “they walked side by side, they truly became friends ”(Mitchell 2004: 90). This is a significant for Gilgamesh because...
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...Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) There are numerous different mental disorders that people are diagnosed with on an everyday basis. Some mental disorders are genetic, but yet other disorders come from the things that people encounter in life. One mental disorder that is being diagnosed more often every day is called Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. This is a disorder that does not discriminate based on genetics, race, age, or even sex. This mental disorder occurs due to events in a person’s life. As everyone knows it is natural for humans to feel fear and be cautious in a dangerous time or event. This natural human reaction is called “fight-or-flight” response, and is a healthy reaction a person has that prevents a person from harm. When a person has Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, this normally healthy reaction is changed or damaged. People, who experience this mental disorder, feel they are still always in danger, even when the danger is no longer present. Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome is an anxiety disorder people get after they witness a tragic or dangerous event. Some events that can trigger Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome include violent assaults, accidents, military combat, natural disasters, or deaths. People with Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome do not know how to cope with the trauma they have experienced. These people have reoccurring memories of the stressful event, or trauma they encountered. Post Traumatic...
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...Traumatic Experiences | January 1 1980 | Research Process I’ve always been fascinated by the military fighting for the freedom of The United States because certainly there are people out there looking to destroy what we have. I grew a fascination toward military personnel in general because I loved playing the game series “Call of Duty”, which gave me an idea to join the marines, but due to the situation with family, I chose not to go through with my decision. They told me that I was going to waste my life going to war and that my family moved to The United States to serve a better life for their children, not make it harder. They believed this because my cousin, as my parents would say, “he came back from war and he didn’t come back the same”. My cousin went through two tours of Iraq between the time of 2007-2009 and before that he had two years of training. In total he spent six years with the military before retiring; He had issues transitioning from a marine infantry soldier to normal civilian life and I observed and wondered what was wrong with him. The reason I chose this article was because this was an in depth-review of post-traumatic disorder at the time of 2007, which was around time the time my cousin enlisted to the marines. My goal was to see if his PTSD could have been prevented if he had done some research before enlisting into the military. This article Occupational Medicine: Post-traumatic Stress Disorder had and overall in-depth information regarding...
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...Effects of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Post traumatic stress disorder, also known as PTSD, is an anxiety disorder that is developed after people are exposed to a horrific or life-threatening experience. Symptoms of PTSD may appear immediately or it may appear years later. Even though they may not be present for the traumatic event, family members and significant others such as spouses can be affected indirectly and can also develop certain behaviors. PTSD is commonly characterized by flashbacks and recurrent dreams; sudden irritability and outbursts toward another person without any obvious or known reasons; and restlessness or difficulty sleeping and concentrating. (Neeb, page 169) Traumatic experiences such as witnessing the death of a loved one, being sexually abused or assaulted, being exposed to a war, and being involved in a devastating accident can all cause PTSD. The likelihood of a person developing PTSD is based on the intensity of the trauma. According to the National Institute of Health, once PTSD has developed, women are more prone to experience chronic symptoms of this disorder compared to men. PTSD not only affects the person directly involved in the traumatic situation, but it can also affect people indirectly through exposure to a devastating event. I have recently experienced a very traumatic situation that had caused some early signs of PTSD. My cousin, John, was recently murdered in the comfort of his own home. His wife found him dead after returning...
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...shut and you collapse to the floor realizing that this is the end. In those final agonizing moments knowing that this is the end, how would you handle those final moments and how would you feel about your life up to this point. In reading the scenario the first emotion that hit me was that of anxiety. I was not necessarily feeling anxiety about the fact that I would inevitably die in the situation but anxiety about what my family would feel with my dying. It made me feel sorrowful. I imagine the things that my loved ones would experience after this type of scenario and also the things that I would not be present for in their future lives. I would want my husband to mourn my loss but I would also want him to be able to move on and enjoy the rest of his days and I would want him to be strong and I am hopeful that if this type of scenario, or any other in which I were not to survive for that matter, that he would be strong. I would want him to be strong for himself and for our children, they would need him to show them how to move past this type of experience and enjoy their lives to the fullest. In the final moments...
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...of that service member. The actual emotional and psychological effects of war on soldiers can be difficult and seem unfair to the family and friends of those soldiers who feel that after all they've been through, they continue to suffer; and sometimes they suffer in silence. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder,...
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...Post traumatic stress disorder or PTSD is a psychological disorder that is triggered when an individual experiences a traumatic event in their lives. Most people that suffer from PTSD show symptoms that can have negative impacts on their lives. With the right professional help, sufferers of PTSD can recover and maintain a normal and healthy lifestyle. Following a traumatic experience, individuals may start showing symptoms of PTSD within the first month. However, symptoms may not surface for a year or more. The symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder are placed into three categories; intrusive memories, increased anxiety or hyper-arousal, or avoidance and numbing. An individual that has PTSD my show symptoms of; flashbacks, bad dreams about the experience, avoiding talking or thinking about experience, feeling numb emotionally, hopelessness, decreased activity, irritability, anger, guilt, sleep disturbance, or hearing or seeing things that are not real (Mayo Clinic, 2012). Negative emotions are a normal reaction that an individual may feel after experiencing a traumatic event, however, when the symptoms last more than a month medical attention should be sought. Symptoms arise when a person is not able to deal with the trauma experienced and in severe cases a person may want to inflict harm onto themselves or another individual (Mayo Clinic, 2012). PTSD may develop after a person experiences, sees, or learns of an event that causes...
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...All people handle traumatic experiences in different ways, but some people chose not to address them at all. This is harmful, experts say “Overcoming traumatic stress is all about taking action. Positive action can help you overcome feelings of fear, helplessness, and hopelessness—and even small acts can make a big difference (Robinson, Smith, Segal Traumatic Stress). By leaving traumatic events unacknowledged, it can cause anger management issues and severe depression among other things (What Happens If Trauma is Left Untreated?, PTST Treatment Help). Therefore, people who have been through trauma should direct their energy into something that kindles their creativity. Artemisia Gentileschi was the major exception among Baroque artists, she not only painted to the...
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...ARNAUD NDIZIHIWE Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder on Soldiers, Communities, Societies From War Participation MARCH 2012 TABLE OF CONTENT PROLOGUE PART I POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER Part II: IMPACT ON THE INDIVIDUAL Part III: IMPACT ON FAMILY Part IV: IMPACT ON THE COMMUNITY PART V: OVERCOMING POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER PART VI: DISCUSSION BIBLIOGRAPHY Post-Traumatic stress Disorders on Soldiers, Communities, Societies from War Participation Prologue A few years back when I was in Rwanda, it was no longer surprising to a attend a memorial ceremony and each time, all of a sudden, some women would start screaming:"They are coming for me!" as if they were being chased to death or men losing control and start shouting at another group of people:"You murderers!". We were used to this phenomenon but a newcomer would certainly creep out. For me, their reaction is perfectly understandable and tough I view it from my country's perspective and experience, post traumatic stress disorder is a global sociological and psychological issue that needs to be addressed. Conflicts inciting violence are still going on, some have ended but a large number of war survivors and victims are still haunted by the memories, they have experienced the worst situations humanly possible and if the issue is not addressed properly, trauma can be perpetual...
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...Sepsis Related ARDS and PTSD Sepsis Related ARDS and PTSD Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a traumatic life-altering illness that can be caused by sepsis. It can be especially traumatic if it is acquired as a young adult and Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) develops as a person enters into later life. Re-living or even a perception, or fear of a reoccurrence of a traumatic event can manifest itself into PTSD. My PICO question asks: for sepsis related ARDS patients, does the use of counseling reduce the risk of PTSD, compared with patients without counseling? My research on this question could not be fully supported. It is suggested that biological influences and life experience play a much larger role in PTSD than counseling. Post-traumatic stress disorder is a psychological and physical response to a life-threatening trauma. The perception of the trauma is characterized as an individual perception and is different for each person. The psychological response can include re-experiencing the trauma, intrusive thoughts and memories, overwhelming fear, depression and disassociations with the trauma. The physical response can include, but are not limited to, nausea, headache, palpitations, diarrhea, vomiting and insomnia. Without treatment, psychological disabilities can manifest into substance abuse, physical abuse and mental disorders. In order for patients to recover, learning how to expand on the relationship between mental health and physical health and...
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...individual experiences trauma the mind is affected in ways such as inability to concentrate due to continuous playback of the events. According to Dr. Langberg (2001), an individual who has experienced trauma can experience three different characteristics: silence, isolation or helplessness; an individual may experience one or all three characteristics of trauma. Moreover, Dr. Langberg (2001) distinguishes two memory responses to trauma; one is intrusion where the individual continues to relive the event or constriction where the individual forgets aspects of the trauma or shows no emotion regarding the trauma. In addition, memory can also be detached or disjointed such as in an individual who can retell the event, however shows no physical reaction to the retelling of the event (Langberg, 2001). Dr. Langberg (2001) provided a superlative statement regarding trauma memory “I can’t remember what I want to and I can’t forget what I want to forget”; this sums up traumatic memory....
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...Conrad Jorge November 21, 2010 Identity after Traumatic Experiences Most of us have experienced or seen the effects of trauma, whether we experienced it first hand or though a shared experience that struck close to home. Trauma is unavoidable, the result of experiencing something that is too difficult to cope with. In “Selections from Losing Matt Shepard”, Beth Loffreda discusses the murder of Matthew Shepard in Laramie Wyoming and it’s traumatic effect on the university and community as a whole. She focuses heavily on the idea of identity, both that of the individual and the shared identity of the community after the traumatic event of his death. Trauma is of particular interest to Martha Stout, author of “When I Woke up on Tuesday, It was Friday”. She questions idea of sanity and whether we can truly call ourselves sane. She uses examples of her patients to discuss the effects of trauma on a person’s memory, feelings, and ultimately their identity. In “Into the Wild”, Jon Krakauer implies some of these same concepts with the story of Chris Candles and his travels in the Alaskan wilderness. Through out the story Chris seems to be searching for his own identity and seemingly trying to cope with damage and after effects of childhood trauma. Trauma as personally experienced or shared through a community causes a disconnection between individual and shared identity, significantly damaging and profoundly affecting our self and shared perceptions, feelings, and opinions of ourselves...
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...After reviewing the work of Patricia Resick (1988, 1993), Charles Marmar (1989) and James Pennebaker (1989, 1997), and from my own experience of training with Lou, it became obvious to me that the type of exposure was very important. If we could help survivors construct complete narratives of their traumatic experiences while in a relaxed state, we could help them to accelerate healing of their traumatic stress symptoms. By facilitating this important narrative process, not only are we assisting them with confronting the traumatic material, we are also helping them to structure the intrusive sensory traumata into language. These previously mentioned researchers have been able to demonstrate that effective narrative construction has a powerful...
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...extremely stressful conditions were often seen in these novels, but in hindsight they’re hardly ever described or labeled as the mental disorders they likely are. Such examples of psychological trauma are used to set the stage for describing the individuals involved without much thought to the consequence of naming such disorders or what the diagnosis entail, such as post-traumatic stress disorder. While Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) has remained, by and large, an accompanying evil byproduct of war it is not solely reserved for the soldiers who fight in battle; PTSD can be observed condition in any human being that has ever experienced disturbing events like those seen during war and armed conflict. In the books A Long Way Gone, Novel Without a Name, and Slaughter House Five there are clear undertones and powerful warning sign of post-traumatic stress disorder revealed in the characters during the course of the novels even if the condition was unnamed. In the book A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, the principal character in a story and author of this novel clearly pronounces his own battles with post-traumatic stress disorder. Beah speaks of the war violating the peaceful and happy ways of life in his home, Sierra Leone while he was only 10 years old and of how he was force onto an expedition to find his family that morphed into bloody fighting and a retribution for their deaths and of pure survival. Beah is witness to death, despair, murder, rape, and theft and is later...
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...Traumatic One of the biggest obstacles that I have encountered since being diagnosed with major depression and post traumatic stress disorder is my disconnect lack of concentration, inability to feel enjoyment and intrusiveness. Apparently my mind lost room for anything but traumatic experiences, which I’m oftentimes, trapped awake. I had no idea why it took me so long to read a few pages of a book or why I had to re-read those same pages or how I made it home driving from point A to B. I had no idea why I couldn’t even sit down in my group session to write a thought when others were communicating their thoughts in matters of minutes. My traumatic experiences began when I was just nine years old. I went through life with little to no memories of my early events. I struggle everyday to hang tight to my positive mentally, push through; to focus on the task at hand and most importantly ask for help. For me, I just had some bad experiences and I won’t let them define me or stifle my future. I remember several attempts in April 2015 to pull myself up from my boot straps by going to different community resource areas asking for help that I experienced crying spells, headaches, chest pains and several others affected emotional response while telling my story. I felt battered with distress and drained without any help being offered. Enough was enough. I then reached out to a veterans program at seeking employment but had to get a mental evaluation. Upon being evaluated I had to...
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