Transcript
Your family is involved
if you have posttraumatic stress disorder.
They have to live with you, they experience your symptoms,
they're probably concerned about you,
so yes, they have to be involved in treatment
because they already are involved with the problem.
Now, does that mean they have to be in your sessions with you?
No, we prefer that that not happen.
Does that mean that they have to be informed
of what you're doing and why?
Absolutely.
We want you to have the social support of your spouse
and family so that they give you time to do your homework,
which would be an exposure-based homework,
either re-living the experience over and over again,
listening to the tapes, or doing the in vivo exposures.
They have to understand why you'd want
to do exactly what you've been avoiding,
even if it makes you feel bad.
So they need to be part of the treatment in so far as
they understand it and that you bring them into it
so that they know to help you take the time to do it.
They also need to be your coaches, your cheerleaders,
the people who push a little bit further.
When you're working out,
it's much easier to have a workout partner who,
on the days you don't feel like doing it, will call you up
and say, "Come on, let's do it."
Well, your family can be that for you,
so we always encourage people to involve their family,
not necessarily in the details or specifics
of what you've been through,
but in the overall process of the treatment.