Trauma & Grief
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Also known as PTSD
A lasting stress response after a traumatic event, where the threat keeps replaying in the body long after it has ended.
What it can feel like
- Intrusive memories, flashbacks or nightmares
- Vivid sensory memory of the event, smells and sounds included
- Avoiding places, people or thoughts linked to it
- Hypervigilance, jumpiness, feeling unsafe
- Flatness or numbness and a sense of being cut off
Not everyone has every symptom, and you do not need a label to deserve support.
Things that help
Use grounding, not avoidance
When a flashback starts, orient: feet on the floor, name the date, describe the room. It signals the present and shortens the episode.
Go slowly, with support
Trauma work is effective but should be paced. Evidence-based therapies such as trauma-focused CBT and EMDR are done with a trained clinician.
Rebuild a sense of safety
Predictable routines, rest and contact with safe people are not avoidance, they are the foundation treatment needs.
Want to actually do these? Save them to your practices and tick them off as you go.
Add to my practicesWhen to reach for more support
Speak to a GP about trauma-focused therapy. Specialist referral is normal and not a sign that things are worse.
Often looked at together
Adjustment Disorder
Distress that arrives within three months of a significant change, such as a breakup, job loss, illness or move, and outweighs what would be expected.
Complex PTSD
Prolonged or repeated trauma, often in childhood or in a relationship, that shapes how safe, worthy and in control you feel as a person.
Prolonged Grief Disorder
Grief that stays acute and disabling for over a year, where the loss dominates daily life and normal life does not resume.