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The Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Sourcebook
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The Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Sourcebook

A Guide to Healing, Recovery and Growth

Glenn R. Schiraldi
McGraw-Hill, 2000
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Editorial Rating

8

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  • Innovative
  • Applicable

Recommendation

Some people’s lives are picture-perfect, filled with sunny days, starry nights and happy weekends. The good times just keep on coming. For post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) victims, things also go on forever. Over and over, they mentally relive their most traumatic experiences in a continuing nightmare. PTSD is insidious. First you are the victim of severe, unspeakable trauma. Then, like a ghost, the trauma comes back to haunt you. Many associate PTSD only with combat veterans. However, almost any severe, stressful event can cause PTSD, be it rape or assault, abuse, a natural disaster, a terrorist attack or an accident. PTSD is a deadly, serious problem that plagues its victims. Fortunately, it does not have to be a life sentence. Treatment is available and recovery is possible, as Glenn R. Schiraldi explains in this thorough sourcebook. In fact, he states firmly that PTSD is curable with the proper therapies. If you or someone you care about suffers from PTSD, getAbstract thinks this book could be useful, helpful and encouraging.

Summary

An Ancient Disorder

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) became a highly publicized medical problem when American solders returned home from the Vietnam War during the 1960s and ’70s. Some of them were seared in horrific ways by their combat experiences, burnt-out, vacant-eyed and fearful. Others were constantly agitated. Some quickly retreated from all human company and went to live in the wild. Others could not deal with the trauma they had witnessed, and became drug addicts or alcoholics. Some went on confused, dangerous rampages. Others committed suicide.

PTSD plagued soldiers and other trauma victims long before today’s diagnostic classification. Medics called it “shell shock” during World War I and “battle fatigue” during World War II, but PTSD’s lineage is even more ancient. In The Odyssey, Homer wrote of the “travails of Odysseus,” including flashbacks. In 490 B.C., Herodotus wrote about a soldier who lost his eyesight after he witnessed the death of his friend. In the 16th century, in Henry IV, Shakespeare wrote of the great concern Lady Percy had for her husband, the soldier Hotspur. He suffered depression, insomnia and night...

About the Author

Glenn R. Schiraldi, Ph.D., is an expert on anxiety, stress, depression and anger. He has written numerous books on these topics. He is a former faculty member at the University of Maryland and he worked on stress management at the Pentagon.

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