Lets Create A Ptsd Diagnosis - Off-topic Discussion

[anthony]

Any correlation to PTSD?

PTSD is about trauma, not about whether you were nurtured or not during early childhood. Where does mental health diagnosis begin and end? Creep is the issue for this reason, people are becoming bored and attempting to fit everything into PTSD, instead of looking at the other 600 pages of diagnoses.

This thing about people jumping towards PTSD has to stop. It isn't the one stop shop for all trauma diagnosing.

 

[Deleted member 28740]

This thing about people jumping towards PTSD has to stop. It isn't the one stop shop for all trauma diagnosing.

I appreciate that. My diagnosis was from several Crit A's, many years after events, and I had no idea why my life was disintegrating. Very little mental health involvement. The diagnosis is accurate for me, but some therapy has brought up other early childhood events, and T was not clear on the impacts of those episodes and the Crit A. I appreciate your frustration with this work you are doing, and individuals that are on the learning curve. Again, thank you for the work and this remarkable community.

 

[Friday]

...my thought was more along the lines of someone knowing their victim loves pets in general, making them watch their suffering as a method of torture where the victim wouldn't care the same way for people.

Have known several in my life where frankly people, they wouldn't give a damn about, pets? Whole another world to get to them.

My city switched to usually including pets in restraining orders in DV, because of the huge number of cases where the abuser would kill &/or mutilate the family pet and leave its carcass in the child's bed, nailed to the front door, etc. But that's a cruelty against animals charge, without the restraining order, and didn't apply -legally- as a threat / punishment/ abuse/ terrorizing against the spouse & kids specifically, so couldn't be used. With the restraining order on the pets, by breaking the order, it can be used in court to show yet another instance of domestic violence / with immediate threat attached that was a game changer, as anything that was done to the animal could be reasonably assumed to be a threat about what would be done to you or your kids, next.

I wonder, though, if killing or mutilating animals in order to torture or terrorize someone else would ever exist in a context that didn't already qualify as CritA? My brain just keeps throwing out CritA examples; DV, Trafficking, K&R... & then my mind just shuts off.

@Changeling - my issue is childhood abuse, so by the proposed criteria, I don'...

My understanding is that both physical abuse & prolonged neglect constitute threat to life. One from violences perpetrated, one from necessities (food/water, clothing, shelter) withheld.

 

[Deleted member 28740]

hold place

 

[KwanYingirl]

First off, what is Criterion A? Secondly, do people with, say, cancer join together in a group to discuss their legitimacy? Cancers don't fit into a nice box with pretty ribbons, just as PTSD doesn't. People with cancer fully accept others with that DC into their group. I don't understand why this thread even exists? Everything discussed here is well documented and I am left with feeling like someone doesn't want so many people labeled with PTSD. I think the brainiacs who have access to large groups of people and state of the art imaging devices will parse this out.

 

[Sideways]

@KwanYingirl - I can't speak to the situation in the US, but there is a very vocal movement in Australia, originating from sufferers, for better understanding of exactly what (clinical) Depression is, how it ought to be recognised, and getting the population at large better informed about the illness. The is a similar, although not so prominent movement for (clinical) Anxiety. In my mind, similar advocacy and education is warranted for PTSD (imho).

 

[joeylittle]

I wonder, though, if killing or mutilating animals in order to torture or terrorize someone else would ever exist in a context that didn't already qualify as CritA?

I don't think so, because it'd be in one of the following contexts:

• 'watch out, or this will happen to you' (threat of death or catastrophic injury)
• 'I'm doing this so I can watch you suffer' (implies that viewer/victim is unable to leave/rendered helpless/see above)

Just my .02$

 

[UnKnown-Self]

I think those who serve in the military and develop PTSD has many different aspects that are unique to our troops. That uniqueness I don't believe is being addressed and they are not getting the proper help or support they need, deserve and earned.
Nor are the families they return home to.
They are taught before being deployed to suck it up, bury it and focus on their mission. That training.... Is the very thing that hinders them from getting help.
It has to come out somewhere so they sometimes act out with their families, causing more trauma.
War has a much higher price then we realize because our troops who return and their families become the unrecognized and discounted casualties of war. They deserve better from our government for their service and sacrifice.

 

[Sideways]

@FridayJones - I've handled workers compensation claims in the past for abattoir workers who developed mental illness from their work. I can't say for sure that ptsd was in the mix because it was too many years ago to recall specific diagnoses - but the injury rates were high enough that the company self-insured for work cover claims, which is really rare here. There's only a handful of very large employers that don't just use the State owned insurer, & they tend to be more like the mining giants. Abattoirs really stick out in that regard.

The only reason I add that is that (just thinking out loud) - frequently witnessing the deliberate toture & slaughter of animals can really mess a person up. I'm not sure it meets the Crit A theshold though. I think there'd need to be some solid stats & evidence on the animals issue first.

 

[Sideways]

@Alice.in.Wonderland - yup, so while there's just the one primary ptsd diagnosis, that's exactly one of the reasons why I support the criteria A threshold being kept reasonably high.

 

[Sighs]

I am left with feeling like someone doesn't want so many people labeled with PTSD

I've said it before and I'll say it again - I find it really insulting to those who have suffered capital T - Trauma to open the floodgates and say "well, if you were upset by your small t - trauma then you can have the same label (and by implication the same level of compensation / government aid etc).

I find it insulting beyond measure for someone to say "my partner cheated on me" or "this one time someone yelled at me in front of my friends" and therefore I have PTSD just like your combat vet partner does. Really? Really? You think that your ordinary life event (albeit upsetting) catapults you to the realms of war? (To be clear - I am not attacking @KwanYingirl here - that is not what she said - I am speaking to the hypothetical person claiming a PTSD diagnosis without a Crit A event.)

In my view Crit A is vital to ensure that capital T - trauma is recognized and treated appropriately. Labels have implications for treatment and for funding. The "semantics" are very important.

 

[Sideways]

@Sighs - I hear what you're saying. For me, this is actually more about accountability in diagnosing people. PTSD seems to be a preferable option (probably for many reasons) to other diagnoses.

If a person presents to a doctor and says "my husband died", there is no doubt in my mind that the person is suffering, legitimately. Real, genuine suffering. There is also no doubt in my mind that the person may have mental health symptoms requiring treatment as a result.

The important thing in my mind is getting that person diagnosed correctly, so that they can be treated correctly. In my mind, I remove the question of "better or worse" suffering.

But what I do ask is "what mental illness does this person actually have?" Maybe it's ptsd because they saw their husband shot in an armed robbery AND they have symptoms consistent with ptsd. Or maybe they watched their 80 year old husband slowly die of Parkinsons and they present with all of the symptoms of depression.

The importance is calling for more accountability in diagnosis. A massive trauma, like Criteria A, sets in motion particular symptoms. We know this. That's ptsd. The value in this exercise is requiring the doctor to actually look closer at the clinical presentation before them - sometimes that means telling a person that no, it's not ptsd, it's "something else".

There seems to be some fear in some quarters about losing the ptsd diagnosis, and being disgnosed with "something else". But that is not saying "you're not suffering enough", it's just saying "you're experiencing something else...it's not the same, it's different."

Maybe the "something else" is not as palatable for some reason. Maybe doctors don't want to tell patients it's "something else" so they reach for ptsd. Either way, in my mind, everyone benefits from an accurate diagnosis.