Pay Tribute To The Veterans In Your Life By Learning More About PTSD
My ability to sit peacefully day after day and write about health or enjoy my family owes more than I’ll ever know to the hard work and sacrifice of generations of American men and women who served in the Armed Forces. On behalf of my colleagues at Harvard Health Publications: Thank you for your service.
One of the challenges faced by many servicemen and servicewomen returning from war is post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
In a nutshell, post-traumatic stress disorder is a lasting and exaggerated reaction to a terrifying or life-threatening event. It makes a person feel like he or she is living through the event over and over again. PTSD shows itself in three main ways:
Re-experiencing. People with PTSD mentally relive the triggering trauma in daytime flashbacks, nightmares, or inescapable thoughts about the event. Sights, sounds, smells, or other stimuli can bring the event to life.
Avoidance. People with PTSD tend to Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Harvard Health Blog*
By now, most everyone is familiar with the tragic circumstances in which a visitor on a trail in Yellowstone National Park on July 6, 2011 surprised a brown (grizzly) bear with cubs, provoking a fatal attack. Fortunately, events like this are rare. At the same time, they are also predictable by virtue of our understanding of bear behavior, particularly in the wildland-urban interface. It was not the victim’s fault, and our hearts go out to his family and friends. For the benefit of others who will backpack and explore in bear country here is an excerpt about avoidance of hazardous animals, in particular bears, adapted from the book Medicine for the Outdoors:
