How to Help the Traumatized RENO, NV (KUNR) - Dr. Rebecca Jankovich, PhD can be reached at 322-1839

Most of us don't know what to do to help someone who's gone through a trauma. We rely on what we think we would be feeling if the same thing had happened to us, or we do what we've seen people do on television, in movies, in books. Trauma is frightening; it's something terrible that's occurs out of our control. Trauma means we're not really "safe" even if we think we're doing everything right. Trauma covers any event in which a person imagines they might be harmed or killed: sexual or physical abuse as a child, sexual assault, muggings or beatings, combat injuries, accidents. Trauma also includes harm through natural disasters such as fire, storms, earth quakes.
We've learned that people have a hard time recovering from a trauma. After WWII, the phrase "post traumatic stress" was coined to cover veterans who struggled to accept the horrors they witnessed or experienced. Now, we use post traumatic stress, or PTSD, to explain the difficulties rape victims have returning to a normal sex life, or that survivors of hurricanes have trying to put their lives back on track. In PTSD the survivor is overwhelmed with memories, sometimes flashbacks, of the trauma; they have trouble focusing because they keep thinking about what happened to them. They usually have elevated levels of anxiety, are quick to startle to abrupt sounds, have trouble sleeping. They might become depressed, withdraw from interaction with their friends or work, lose interest in what they used to enjoy. They often can't be near anything that reminds them of the trauma; if they were raped in their home, they can't be comfortable at home; if the drunk driver hit their car driving over Mt. Rose, they can't drive that way to Lake Tahoe. It's normal for the healthy survivor to take about 6 months to work through what happened to them and once again become themselves. The first 6-8 weeks are the worst, and then they gradually get better.
The more squared away the person is before the trauma, the more quickly they get through the symptoms of PTSD. The more traumas someone has already endured, the more difficult it is for the person to get through the symptoms of the next trauma. Someone who was sexually abused as a kid, is going to have a harder time plowing through the symptoms following a robbery and beating than is someone for whom this is the first trauma.
For just about everyone, the best predictor of quick recovery is a good social support system. The emphasis is on "good", because the support system can also make it worse by not understanding the process of trauma recovery. The survivor typically wants to talk about the trauma over and over, way more times than anyone around them really wants to hear it. The repetitive story telling actually helps the survivor grasp what's happened to them; until they have a way to make sense out of it, they can't get over it hence, the retelling of the story. You give good support if you patiently listen as many times as they need to tell their story.
Good support does not diminish the impact of the event; good support accepts that it was just as dreadful as the survivor thinks it was. The trauma may not seem all that terrible to you, but if you tell the survivor it wasn't all that awful and they should get over it, you're going to make them worse. They're more likely to feel broken and damaged instead of courageous and determined. Think anything you want, but act like you understand the event to be as horrific as the survivor experienced it to be. Absolutely do not blame the survivor for causing the trauma; even if it's true, it's not helpful.
Skip the platitudes that have simple solutions like: God doesn't give us more than we can handle; time heals everything; you'll be OK. Instead, say things that show the survivor you understand the depth of their reactions: what you went through sounds terrifying; I don't know how you got through all of it; I'm so sorry this has happened to you.
When the survivor struggles with why such an awful thing could have happened to them, say you don't know. Telling them how you make sense out of it is not helpful; they can't just absorb your philosophy; they have to find their own. So, you listen, ask questions, remain patient and don't tell them what to do.
Good social support is critical to helping a survivor move on. Trauma recovery takes time, at least 6 months; you have to be patient hearing the story and not diminishing or dismissing what happened to them. The healing here comes from listening.
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