Trauma During Adulthood

What is a traumatic event?

Traumatic events involve either 1) actual or possible death or serious injury or 2) sexual violence. Most adults have lived through at least one traumatic event and many have experienced more than one event. Trauma can also be chronic, meaning that similar events happen many times over a long period of time.

There any many different types of traumatic events, but here are some examples:

• Sexual or physical abuse or assault
• Serious vehicle accidents
• Combat or war zone exposure
• Serious medical events
• Seeing death or dead bodies, including while at work
• Unexpected death of a loved one
• Natural disasters
• Arson or house fires
• Torture
• Domestic violence
• Witnessing or experiencing violence, such as a homicide or suicide
• Terrorism or mass violence

What are common responses following a traumatic event?

Professionals have found three different paths that adults can follow after trauma:

Some people never experience any major problems. This is known as resistance. Resistance is very common after traumas that do not involve sexual assault or abuse.

Many people have symptoms similar to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in the weeks after a trauma. For most of those people, those symptoms will then go away on their own. This is known as natural recovery or resilience. This path is very common among people who experience sexual assault.

Other people experience problems that do not go away on their own. Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is one potential outcome when this happens. PTSD is described in detail in the next section.

What is Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)?

PTSD is a mental health condition that may be diagnosed by a professional when someone has experienced a traumatic event and is having particular types of problems as a result. The major types of symptoms experienced by people with PTSD include:

• Re-experiencing symptoms, including:
• Flashbacks or intrusive thoughts about the traumatic event
• Intense physical or emotional reactions to reminders of the event
• Nightmares
• Avoidance symptoms, including:
• Avoiding thinking or talking about the trauma
• Avoiding people, places, activities or sensations that remind you of the trauma
• Negative changes in your thinking and emotions, including:
• Feeling more down, depressed, angry or anxious
• Finding it hard or impossible to feel happy
• Feeling shameful or guilty
• Feeling distant from other people
• Losing interest in things you used to enjoy
• Being unable to remember important parts of the trauma
• Having more negative thoughts about yourself, other people and the world
• Hyperarousal or emotional/physical reactivity, including:
• Being always on guard and/or easily startled
• Having trouble concentrating
• Being quick to anger and aggression
• Doing things that are risky (e.g., impulsive sex, binge drinking)
• Having trouble sleeping 

If you are experiencing and of these symptoms please get professional help.. you are not alone! Source