by jphilo | Feb 18, 2013 | Different Dream, In Children, PTSD
10 Causes of PTSD in Children
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental illness vastly under-diagnosed in children. For that reason, I’ve been guest blogging about the topic at Friendship Circle of Michigan’s website. Previous posts in this series explained why I advocate for children with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), explored 5 myths and misconceptions about PTSD in children, and defined both trauma and PTSD from a child’s point of view.
Causes of PTSD in Children
The most recent post in the series identified the following ten causes of PTSD in kids:
- Medical intervention
- Abuse
- Neglect
- Disasters
- Violent acts
- Accidents
- Divorce
- The death of a significant loved one
- Moving
- Adoption
Trauma in the Eyes of a Child
If you’re shaking your head and thinking, “She’s pulling my leg. Those aren’t traumatic events,” then you’re looking at them with the eyes of an adult rather than from a child’s point of view. That train of thought and more detailed explanations of each of the ten items on the list can be found at the blog post 10 Causes of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Children at Friendship Circle’s website.
More Articles about PTSD in Children
Other articles about PTSD in kids at this website include:
Your PTSD Experience
Did you deal with PTSD as a child? Is your child dealing with it now…or do you suspect PTSD? If so, leave a comment about how the condition was diagnosed and treated. Or if you have questions, go ahead and ask. I’ll try to answer or direct you to resources where you can find answers.
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by jphilo | Jan 22, 2013 | Different Dream, In Children, PTSD
PTSD in Kids: What Is It?
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is common in children. More common than adults, who want to believe they can protect kids from all harm, want to admit. Because PTSD in kids is real, parents, educators, medical professionals, therapists, and caregivers need to know as much as possible about the disorder.
PTSD in Kids and Friendship Circle
My latest guest post at Friendship Circle of Michigan’s very informative blog, answers some basic questions about PTSD. The article first defines trauma and then post-traumatic stress disorder. It explains what causes simple trauma to morph into it’s bigger, meaner cousin, post-traumatic stress disorder.
PTSD Resources
The guest post cites books by William E. Krell and co-authors Peter A. Levine and Maggie Kline, resources that explore childhood PTSD in depth. Their books also provide guidance about how to work with traumatized children and prevent simple trauma from becoming post-traumatic stress disorder. So hop on over to the post What Is Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Children? at Friendship Circle of Michigan’s blog to read the whole thing.
PTSD in Kids: More Questions
Of course, reading the post will lead to more questions about the disorder. Questions like:
- Why do some kids develop PTSD after trauma but others don’t?
- What are symptoms and warning signs of PTSD in kids?
- How can it be prevented?
- How can it be treated?
PTSD in Kids: What Do You Want to Know?
Those are the questions that came to mind when I first learned about PTSD in children. Maybe you have other questions spinning around in your head. Go ahead and leave them in the comment box. I’ll do my best to answer your questions in future posts in the Friendship Circle series. If you think your child is suffering from PTSD, visit Intensive Trauma Therapy’s website, www.traumatherapy.us, to learn more.
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by jphilo | Oct 2, 2012 | Different Dream, In Children, PTSD
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Why I Advocate for Kids with PTSD
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in children. The phrase makes me want to put my hands over my face, like the child in the picture, and pretend kids don’t get PTSD.
Why I Advocate for Kids with PTSD
But I can’t, because kids, including my son and my son-in-law, suffered from this very treatable mental illness when they were children. That’s why I jumped at the chance to write an occasional guest blogger series about PTSD in kids for the folks at Friendship Circle of Michigan. The first post in the series tells about our son’s struggle with PTSD. His post-traumatic stress disorder was precipitated by life-saving major surgery shortly after his birth and many more surgeries and invasive medical procedures and tests he endured until age five.
Confessions of a Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Advocate
To read the whole story, scoot on over to the post entitled Confessions of a Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Advocate at the Friendship Circle of Michigan blog. You’ll not only read the story of our son’s struggle with PTSD and his highly successful treatment, but also find out why I’ve become a passionate advocate on the topic. So passionate that an entire chapter of Different Dream Parenting is dedicated to informing parents about PTSD causes, symptoms, and treatments. So passionate, my agent is sending out my book proposal on the topic to publishing houses around the country.
What Do You Want to Know About PTSD?
Over the next several months, I’ll inform DifferentDream.com readers each time a new post in the series is published at Friendship Circle’s blog. And I’ll let you know when a publisher offers a contract, and I start writing the book. In the meantime, please leave a comment about what you want the book to cover. What questions do you have about PTSD in children? What resources do you want to learn about? What resources do you recommend? I would love to hear from other people passionate about PTSD in children!
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by jphilo | Mar 23, 2011 | Different Dream, In Children, PTSD
Can You Imagine Infant Surgery Without Anesthesia?
Warning! This post is not for the faint at heart!
At best, it will show you how far pediatric surgery has advanced since the 1950s. At worst, it will make you sick to think of the trauma endured by tens of thousands of babies before 1986.
What Happened in 1986?
1986 was the year the Academy of Pediatric Surgeons changed their infant surgery protocol. Finally, they added pain medication to the paralytic drugs administered to infants going into surgery.
Yes, you read that correctly. Before 1986, babies going into surgery were given a paralytic drug so they would hold still. But they weren’t given pain medication.
Why Not?
Before 1986, the standard belief was that babies didn’t feel pain like adults do. My husband and I know this was their belief because we heard it often from the neonatal intensive care doctors and nurses in 1982. During Allen’s recovery, we knew he received no pain meds. Still, we assumed they’d been administered during surgery. That assumption was wrong.
How About Now?
These days, if your infant or child has surgery, pain medication is in the mix. But there are three decades worth of babies born in the 1950s through 1986 who were deeply traumatized during surgery. Many of them suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and their lives are in shambles. Our son avoided a ruined life, thanks to the treatment he received at Intensive Trauma Therapy Institute in Morgantown, WV. One of the therapists at the clinic, Dr. Louis Tinnin, recently started a blog about Infant Surgery Without Anesthesia. You can read what he has to say at this link.
What About Those Babies?
If you or someone you know went through infant surgery during the decades of the 50s, 60s, 70s, and early 80s, please pass this information on to them. A life that began with searing pain doesn’t need to be consumed by it. Help is available. I’d be glad to talk to you more about it, so leave a comment if you have questions.
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by jphilo | Jun 9, 2010 | Different Dream, In Children, PTSD
The first post in this series explored how invasive medical procedures can cause PTSD in children. The post listed four factors that increase the likelihood of PTSD developing. The factors are:
- Timing
- Anesthesia
- Age of patient
- Previous Trauma History
As promised in Part 1 of the series, this post will address the general principle behind the occurrence of PTSD and how it can be successfully treated.
General PTSD Principle
Linda Gantt, who spoke at the 2010 Linking PTSD and Medical Trauma national conference, said the risks of developing PTSD increase according to this general principle: The more unexpected the procedure, the younger the patient, the more numerous the previous traumas, and the more urgent the need for the procedure, the greater the possibility that there will be psychological effects.
No Wonder Our Son Had PTSD
When Dr. Gantt’s explained the four factors and the general principle behind them, the burden of guilt I carried about our son’s PTSD no longer weighed upon me. Our son’s medical treatment was completely unexpected, within 24 hours of his birth, and immediately necessary for him to live. With three of the four factors involved in his trauma, no wonder he developed PTSD. And since medically induced PTSD wasn’t even on the radar screen when he had surgery in 1982, no wonder it went undetected for so long.Prevent
How to Prevent PTSD
In 2010, the vast majority of kids can avoid developing medically induced PTSD. Depending on the age of the child and the circumnstances, it can be prevented by:
- having the hospital’s child life specialist help prepare your verbal child for scheduled medical procedures or surgeries.
- having the the child life specialist remediate trauma caused by an emergency medical procedure or surgery in a verbal child.
- having someone rub a pre-verbal child’s arm and talk quietly to him during procedures or surgeries.
- having soft music or a tape recording of the parent’s voice playing during procedures or surgeries.
How to Treat PTSD
Of course, not all PTSD can be prevented. But children can be successfully and easily treated for it. One great treatment resource is Peter Levine and Maggie Kline’s books, Trauma Through a Child’s Eyes: Awakening the Ordinary Miracle of Healing and Trauma-Proofing Your Kids: A Parents’ Guide for Instilling Confidence, Joy and Resilience.
If your child needs professional therapy, I highly recommend the Intensive Trauma Therapy Institute in Morgantown, West Virginia. You can learn more about their clinic at their website www.traumatherapy.com. If you know of other successful treatment centers, please leave a comment. I want every child with PTSD to receive treatment as quickly as possible!
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by jphilo | Jun 7, 2010 | Different Dream, In Children, PTSD
When our son was born in 1982 and flown 750 miles away for life-saving surgery, we asked the medical professionals if the surgery and recovery would somehow affect him later on. “No,” we were told repeatedly, “he’s too young to remember. Besides newborns don’t feel pain.”
Even though the opposite has been proven true since our son’s surgery, the news hasn’t reached segments of the greater medical community. In fact, a mom whose newborn was in a major hospital’s neonatal intensive care (NICU) in December of 2009 was told the same thing we were. “She won’t remember. She’s too young.”
A recent national conference hosted by the Intensive Trauma Therapy Institute in Morgantown, West Virginia focused on the topic. One of the therapists from the institute, Linda Gantt, said the likelihood of PTSD developing after invasive medical procedures during childhood depends upon several contributing factors.
Factor #1: Timing
PTSD is less likely to occur if a medical procedure is scheduled and there’s adequate time to prepare the child beforehand. PTSD is much more likely to occur in emergency situations. Also, if the child’s preparation is age-appropriate, PTSD is less likely to occur.
Factor #2: Anesthesia
The kind of anesthetic used is a major factor. General, local or topical anesthetic should be selected based on the procedure and age of the patient. A patient’s inability to go under increases the likelihood of PTSD developing, as does “coming light” or “partial awakening” during the procedure.
Factor #3: Age of Patient
The younger the patient, the greater the risk of PTSD developing.
- The risk is greatest when kids are non-verbal, birth to age 3. Even when they become verbal, they are unable to access their non-verbal memories using words.
- Children who are verbal, but still in the concrete thinking stage (ages 4 – 10) are also at risk because their reasoning skills are very literal. They can’t yet think abstractly.
- Children from the ages of 12-18 are least likely to develop PTSD if their abstract thinking skills are in place.
Factor #4: Previous Trauma History
Children who have experienced previous significant trauma (sexual abuse, physical abuse, life-threatening situations) are more likely to develop PTSD after medical treatment.
The next post in this series will explore the general principle behind the occurrence of PTSD and how it can be successfully treated.
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