Transcript
So having PTSD is like living with this
overactive alarm system that kicked in because
your body, basically, needed to help you survive,
and so all of the behaviors around being on guard
and being hyper-vigilant, they're completely understandable.
What happens, though, is that after you come back to
a place that is generally safe,
that alarm system is still on high alert.
And so what treatment is is not to turn that alarm system
off completely, but just to dial it down,
just to get it to a place where you are able to
go through your day-to-day life in an easy way,
where you are able to sleep, where you are able to interact
with people, where you are able to go to the mall,
and a big box store, and Disneyland and not have to worry
about what could happen and not having
to always be on guard for danger.
I think some of the Veterans I've worked with
have their greatest successes in just recognizing
they can go with their family to a restaurant and they can sit
anywhere they want, or they can take their family on that trip.
They don't have to stay home.
They don't have to stay apart.
They don't have to stay isolated
because that's a really, really hard feeling.
And over time, people think that that's just who they are,
or they think that they're crazy, and the people
around them think that that's just who they are
and that they mean to be that way.
When the truth is they don't.
It's their body still keeping them
in that survival mode much longer than they need to be.
So with therapy, coming in and being able to
work with somebody to, like I say, dial down those responses
is really what increases people's freedom
and their ability to live their lives.