Acute stress disorders

 Sleep disorders
 Circulatory disorders
 Nightmares
 Anxiety and depression
 Digestive problems, loss of appetite
 Intrusions and flashbacks: constantly reliving the traumatic experience
 Various kinds of psychosomatic symptoms may occur: e.g. pain of unknown origin, genital discomfort
weiter zur Therapie...

Initially, the cause of the discomfort and the symptoms needs to be determined. As a next step, sufferers learn how to control the intrusions (experiencing repeated mental flashbacks of the traumatic event) in such a way that they are not overwhelmed by them.
Subsequently, individually tailored behaviour strategies to overcome the disorder are developed according to the specific requirements of each case. In this process, we employ:

 Imaginative techniques: This approach takes advantage of the fact that our brain is capable of producing unpleasant and disquieting fantasies as well as creating soothing and liberating images.
 Narrative techniques: This is meant to help to comprehend personal experiences in such a way that the traumatic event(s) can be accepted for what they are to make peace with the past. As a result, sufferers learn not to let trauma control their lives anymore – although it is a part of their life history and cannot be undone, it does no longer affect their happiness and emotional well-being.
zurück zur Definition
zurück zu Symptome...