Pinellas Park PTSD Counseling
They say time heals everything. But as time stretches forward and you’re still stuck with the same or increasing level of fear, anxiety, and depression, you need to consider asking for support. ‘Never easy’ is an understatement to describe how to cope up with PTSD, especially when you’re all alone.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a type of anxiety disorder that can be developed when extreme feelings of fear, sadness, anxiety, and isolation linger in you for a long time after a traumatic experience. This can be brought by unpleasant events such as war, rape, any form of abuse, death, or even natural disasters. Any unwanted event that shattered you emotionally can trigger PTSD.
Whether you are the one who personally faced the experience or you are a witness to an event, you can be vulnerably prone to PTSD. This can also be caused by surgery performed to young children who are not armed to understand such happenings yet. Whatever life event that may have overwhelmed your emotional balance, seeking help and treatment can teach you to manage and address your symptoms, lessen painful memories, and overcome such a dreadful past.
Here at Winning at Home Tampa Bay, we allow you to breathe and let go of the hostile feelings keeping you from peace. We want to let you know that it is best to seek help as early as you suspect yourself or your loved one of having PTSD. The process is way easier if you have the right guidance and understanding from doctors or therapists rather than confronting it all alone.
Let’s discuss how to overcome that long, dark alley together.
Contact Winning at Home Tampa Bay at (727) 513-4505 for a free initial consultation with a Pinellas Park PTSD counselor now.
Your Ways Out of PTSD
You need to reclaim control over your life. Symptoms like insomnia, sudden flashbacks, low self-esteem, and unexpected burst of emotions must be managed through the guidance of mental health professionals. To effectively treat PTSD, psychological therapies are commonly recommended first. However, psychotherapy and medication may be used for severe PTSD.
Psychotherapies
1. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)
PTSD therapies mostly fall under cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). Its main goal is to change the way you think and how you act on what you think. This can be done through talking and confronting your trauma, including everything that bothers you. Our therapists will help you cope up with your stress and being upset by turning your negative thoughts about the experience into something that will strengthen your mind.
This therapy also includes encouragement to do certain activities that you stopped doing since the incident. CBT helps you understand and accept that what happened is already a part of you, and we will guide you in figuring out how to gradually live with it. Our sessions will usually be 8-12 weeks of trauma-focused CBT with every session that lasts for around 60-90 minutes.
2. Prolonged Exposure Therapy
This therapy works by facing the same situations and memories you’re stuck with. Exposure therapy can be done if you are avoiding things that remind you of the traumatic event or if you experience frightening flashbacks and nightmares. An approach can be through virtual reality programs that enable you to return to the setting of the traumatic event.
Our therapist will teach breathing techniques first to manage your anxiety when you encounter your past. After that, you’ll make a list of the things you avoided and start facing them again. In some of our sessions, you’ll recount the upsetting experience, then go home and listen to a recording of yourself. This therapy will make you face your fears, in the truest sense of the notion. PE has around 8-15 sessions, with usually 90 minutes every session.
3. Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR)
EMDR is a relatively new treatment found to reduce symptoms of PTSD. It combines exposure therapy with a series of eye movements. Our Pinellas Park, FL therapist will make you process your traumatic memory while you watch something they do, like hand movements, flashing light, or making a sound. It aims to change the way you act with the trauma or think about something positive while you remember it. EMDR can take about three months of weekly sessions.
4. Stress Inoculation Training and Group Therapy
If you find it helpful to talk about your problems with other people who experience the same, we will make it happen. We will help find ways suitable for your situation to manage your symptoms and cope with your condition. SIT, on the other hand, can be done alone or with a group. This way, you don’t have to go into the details of your trauma. This will help you focus more on the way you deal with your stress.
An approach may be learning massage and breathing techniques or anything that relaxes your mind and body. Approximately three months will be enough to lower the stress caused by the unfortunate event gradually.
Medication
Medications will help you with specific symptoms like insomnia, depression, and anxiety. Professionals from Winning at Home Tampa Bay will prescribe medicine when there is a reason to be, so you don’t have to feel more worry. Antidepressants will help you manage depression and anxiety symptoms, sleeping problems, and concentration. This includes FDA approved selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI)—sertraline and paroxetine.
Other medications that our doctors may require you to take are monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs), antipsychotics, anti-anxiety drugs, beta-blockers, and benzodiazepines. One medicine may be enough, or a combination will be prescribed depending on your situation and progress. So it is crucial to take a step with us now before it’s too late.
Lean On with PTSD Counselors in Pinellas Park
For years, we have listened to numerous problems and had provided relief to those who are willing to get a fresh start. Before we start with any treatment, our counselors will conduct a detailed assessment of your symptoms to ensure that treatment will be appropriate. Winning at Home Tampa Bay is here to support you with your dilemma. We will help you defy and destroy the ghosts of your past.
Our trained and professional personnel are experts in handling specific conditions. You might feel reluctant to ask for help, but we assure you that acting on it earlier will lead to faster treatment progress. Our specialists give careful monitoring with your symptoms to tell if you’re improving or getting worse. Your willingness is an important factor in your wellness.
We Listen to Your Memories
We understand that confronting what’s behind is never easy, so much more when it keeps on pulling you back. When you start experiencing unsettling symptoms as mentioned above, or if you know someone who does, please do not hesitate to seek support. Save yourself or your loved one from the complexity of the human mind and the biological repercussions of one traumatic event.
Contact Winning at Home Tampa Bay at (727) 513-4505 for a free initial consultation with a Pinellas Park PTSD counselor now.