We catch our breath as we hear that Virginia Tech has once again faced a shooting and the violent deaths of two people on campus.  In this case seven minutes after police reported the shooting, students were informed and alerted by email, text, twitter and campus broadcast to stay where they were in locked down locations, to remain off campus or to be escorted to safety areas. As the students reported, they waited in fear for four hours uncertain of what would unfold. When told it was safe, they hesitated leaving.

As is the nature of trauma, those who faced this present trauma live in the shadow of the tragic past and those in the past may be re-awakened to the horror and loss they have been carrying. To a large degree many emotionally and physically once again bear witness to a terrifying and unimaginable event.

While a person’s reaction to trauma is a function of the personal meaning of the event to them, their physical and emotional proximity to the traumatic event as well as their personal history, we have come to know that as an initial help, Psychological First Aid (PFA) can mediate the impact of trauma and make possible steps toward healing.

Dealing with trauma across the timeline from acute impact to long term recovery, I have found personally and professionally that there are aspects of Psychological First Aid that are vital in helping and healing at any time.

Here are some suggestions worth knowing and owning in the aftermath of trauma and re-traumatization.

Whether you are someone who lives around the piles of things you cannot throw away, you had an aunt who was too embarrassed to let anyone into her cluttered home or you have seen the TV show “Hoarders” – you know something about hoarding.

What is less known is the cause. Hoarding which involves thoughts, feelings and behavior and can be chalked off as eccentric or can be so extreme as to compromise living space, relationships, health and even life is not completely understood. It has usually been considered a symptom of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) but this does not fit for all hoarders. Few hoarders actually seek treatment.

The news of Bin Laden’s death has erupted on national and international levels in a mix of feelings. Attached to the thrill of justice served and military courage recognized are shadows of fear and the pain of catastrophic loss.

For survivors and the thousands who lost so many loved ones on 9/11 this is not only long awaited news, it is a déjà vu of that September day.

Once again there are ongoing calls of condolence and remembrances, non-stop media reports, and the visceral pain of losing a Dad, a child, a partner, a firefighter, a friend, a community, and the illusion of safety.

What Does this Mean for Emotional Healing?

It Invites Revisiting:

Highly charged events like Bin Laden’s Death are quite likely to trigger traumatic memories that unlike ordinary explicit memory for daily events are encoded under fight/flight conditions in those centers of the brain dealing with sensations and emotion. They can be sequestered for years – untold, intrusive as nightmares and flashbacks, haunting but never integrated into the story of one’s life.  While this event might trigger pain, it may offer an opportunity to bear witness, to share and transform traumatic memories.

If you are human, you know about worry.  Worry is the state of negative thinking we engage in when we are faced with a real or anticipated threat. It’s the ”thinking” component of the physical heart racing and sweaty palms that make up anxiety:  “What if I get laid off?”, “Why did he say he was just too tired to make love?”, “How will I tell my wife I want the transfer?”, “ What if I miss my plane?”

Whereas a certain degree of worry can cause us to problem solve, ask for help, change behavior patterns, even enhance our attention to partners, excessive worry burdens us personally and interpersonally. In his book, Worry , psychiatrist Edward Hallowell, suggests that as compared to  “good worry” that leads to constructive action, “ toxic worry” can paralyze us.

Last week, we began discussing dreams. (If you missed those two blog posts, you can check them out here and here.) Now that we have considered the function of dreams, the feelings of the dreamer, symbols, shapeshifters, and the displacement of time and place in the “night theater” of dreams, it is time to ask the question:

Should all dreams be Shared?

Although we consider that all dreams, even nightmares, are opportunities for growth and development, not every dream must or should be shared. Like the best of other dynamics between partners — the choice — to share a dream, do a favor, be sexually intimate … is what makes the action authentic and consciously and unconsciously important to your partner.

You wake at 5 a.m., unable to fall back to sleep. You notice that your partner has no patience for anything, including you. You  find yourself dreading phone calls even from your closest friends. And you wonder:  How can these reactions be normal?

Combat stress, a cancer diagnosis, a car accident or a sudden job loss are events that can jolt us physically, neurochemically and emotionally.  It is common for people to respond to such distressing events with three clusters of symptoms : Intrusion or re-experiencing; hyperarousal; and constriction, numbing and avoidance.

These symptoms often appear within the first days after a trauma. They usually are very intense at first but eventually subside. Sometimes, however, these reactions are delayed.  Couples  who pull together in the crisis, manage  the deployment,  or work side by side after the storm are baffled when things become tense and symptoms erupt four months after Iraq, when the hospital stay is over, when life is supposed to go on.

You may recognize some of these reactions in yourself or your partner. You may be worried about post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a persistent pattern of these symptoms lasting more than a month  for which you may seek professional help. Even in such cases, understanding these symptoms as normal responses to an  abnormal situation will help you manage their impact on your relationship. Let’s consider them.

Re-experiencing symptoms are  like being caught in the indelible imprint of the traumatic moment. It is as if the hospital scene, the oncoming truck, or the explosion are playing over and over again,  in the form of  a nightmare, a flashback,  a frightening thought or a traumatic memory. Although bewildering and disturbing, such repeated intrusions are actually the mind and body’s way of assimilating or fitting  an incomprehensible experience  into your  existing life schema.

Recognizing re-experiencing as a common response may change your reaction.  When you realize that your wife is watching  reruns in bed to avoid closing her eyes and seeing the accident scene,  you may be less likely  to feel rejected, get mad or blame her for sleep problems. Perhaps you will watch some of the reruns together, remind her that you are next to her,  validate the memory as common after the car accident. You might even ask if she wants to talk about the traumatic memory. According to traumatologist Judith Herman,  “the action of telling the story in the safety of a protected relationship can actually produce a …