Trauma is an extreme stressor involving direct personal experience with, observation of, or learning about an event, series of events, or a set of circumstances that involve threatened or actual death or serious emotional or physical harm. This experience may affect an individual’s mental, physical, social, and/or spiritual well-being. Examples include, but are not limited to, natural disasters, serious accidents, terrorist acts, war/combat, sexual assault, physical/emotional abuse during upbringing, significant betrayals or relationship wounds, intimate partner violence, bullying, and repeated exposure to horrible details of trauma.

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was first included in the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 1980. PTSD is not just reserved for veterans and can occur in all people regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic background, or age. PTSD affects approximately 3.5% of U.S. adults each year, with a lifetime prevalence of 8% in adolescents ages 13-18. An estimated one in 11 people will be diagnosed with PTSD in their lifetime.

People who experience PTSD have intense, disturbing thoughts and feelings related to the experience that last long after the traumatic event has ended. They may relive the event through flashbacks or nightmares; they may feel intense sadness, fear, or anger that might make them feel detached or estranged from others. People with PTSD may avoid situations or people that remind them of the traumatic event, and they may have strong, adverse reactions to external cues (triggers) that resemble the traumatic event, like a loud noise or an accidental touch.

It is unclear why some people develop PTSD in response to traumatic experiences while others do not, but further research is still being conducted.