Question:
Our apologies for not splattering and spoilering our previous post. We do believe in spoilering an splattering cause it has made a great deal of difference for us personally a number of times. So thanks to Ravensong’s good catch we’ve gone back and done this for people who would like to read the article. We may not have caught everything and in some places we over did the splattering ~ but we did try to catch everything that people have felt triggered by in the past. For people who dislike splattering and spoilering the origional article was posted here on Sept. 10, 2003 titled "New York Times Article. First is our response to the article in the New York Times called "Is Trauma Being Trivialized?" by Felicia R. Lee. We would greatly appreciate any feedback you have on this and you can reach us here or on RESPONSE: by Anita L. Cape Trauma parallels depression in it’s prevalence. Almost every person can admit to having had a feeling of sadness or even depr*ssion at one time or another in their lives, particularly after the loss of something meaningful to them. But does every person suffer from Major Depr*ssion? No. The important thing though is that any person who experiences depr*ssion deserves a chance to heal that depr*ssion whether it’s from a lifelong chemical imbalance or from the loss of a love one. And people heal depr8ssion in different ways. Some just go to ch*rch and pr*y about it. Others work harder in the work place. Others attend support groups. Often people who experience depr*ssion need medication to help balance their chemistry. Likewise almost every person at some time or another in their lives has something really overwhelming and life-threatening happen to them. People with a single instance of trauma deserve to heal just as much as anyone and to be in control of that healing process. And just like Major Depr*ssion there are individuals who’ve experienced severe profound trauma and are severely affected by it. People who grew up being ab*sed and neglected for the first 18 years of their lives are most likely to suffer from PTSD. People who experienced prolonged life-threat in a war are also likely to suffer from PTSD. What we need are some new terms for sorting out the needs and most appropriate ways to help people heal from trauma. For one we now know that depr*ssion is not caused by a person’s laziness but by a chemical change that occurs within the mind ~ anyone with that altered chemistry would most likely experience it. Likewise, Post Traumatic Stress is a resulting response, not a disorder. It’s PTSR ~ Post Traumatic Stress Response. And we need several different classifications for PTSR; Acute PTSR for a single instance of PTSR that has recently occurred. Military PTSR for those returning from combat. I’ve advocated for Familial PTSR for individuals who’ve been victimized long term by someone they’ve known ~ usually a caregiver. And Judith Herman has long argued for the term "Complex" PTSD for a similar constellation. But Familial/Complex PTSR would also be accompanied with an array of symptoms, for instance, with Dissociation, with anxiety, anger, and/or depression, with a Poly-Identity Framework (i.e. having a variable identity in one’s identity set), etc. And certainly how people appraise their trauma and heal varies. I remember seeing a story of one of the f*reofficers who threw himself into very hard work almost aound the clock with his fellow fireofficers after 9*1 and who seemed to feel that he had no effects from the trauma. An interview with his wife showed a different picture ~ that of a person suffering from many of the classic signs of PTSR including sleep disturbances and relationship problems without any awareness of it. No one would have said to any of the victims of 9*1 "oh, just get over it". Indeed an army of people from across the country would have gladly gone there to help people struck by a single instance of trauma on 9*1 if they’d wanted it. Yet that is often what we tell people who did experience prolonged life-threatening tort*re. One thing we know is that a support system is a key ingredient in helping people to heal from trauma. Being able to control the things we will do to return to a "normal" (for that particular individual) way of life is another. And not having to hide the trauma because of stigma or being called a liar for talking about the trauma is another. Certainly there are people who lie about having depr*ssion or a heart attack or a drug addiction or trauma but anyone wanting to heal trauma deserves to be evaluated for it, to be told about options available in their community, and supported appropriately for their work in overcoming the challenges that cripple their lives. Anita L. Cape, Coordinator Family Trauma Survivors’ Network http://familyptsdnet.tripod.com/ Below is our spoiler for the origional article which quotes what some professionals have said about Trauma and Trauma Survivors. There is also some talk of the kinds of abuse some Trauma Survivors have experienced and some mention of rel*gion. This portion is splattered as well but please read with caution. 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 O.k. nuf spoilering we hope. Please take these people with a grain of salt an be careful if yu’r triggered by hurtful stuff. Is Trauma Being Trivialized? By FELICIA R. LEE Fl*shbacks. Nightmares. Feeling disconnected from your body. Whether it is the anniversary of Sept. 11, the continuing threat of terrorism, sexual abuse by the clergy, school shootings or any one of many other causes of angst, Americans have been inundated with the language of trauma and information about how to cope. But as mental health experts continue to fine-tune our understanding of how the body responds to catastrophic events, some skeptics have been questioning whether terms like "trauma" and "post-traumatic stress disorder" (known as PTSD) are being misused by victims, lawyers and health professionals. "We’ve dumbed down PTSD," said Sally Satel, a psychiatrist and fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. There is a false assumption, she added, that "if something bad happens, people are damaged unless they talk about it." In a society that glorifies confession and victimization, experts are sticking medical labels on people coping with ordinary stresses or misusing them for compensation in lawsuits, said Dr. Satel, who is also the author of "PC, MD.: How Political Correctness Is Corrupting Medicine." As examples, Dr. Satel cites Paula Jones’s claim that she suffered PTSD as a result of her encounters with Bill Clint*n and a recent campaign by some therapists, reported in The Boston Globe, for recognition of a new diagnosis – post-traumatic slavery disorder. And after Sept. 11, Dr. Satel added, New York City was overwhelmed with therapists urging people to talk about their feelings when in fact most people did not need therapy and were not suffering from PTSD. Such claims have incensed many experts in the field. If anything, they argue, r*pe, child ab*se and shoot*ngs are not properly diagnosed while the victims are denigrated and not treated for PTSD. "Post-traumatic stress disorder is a good diagnosis," said Bessel van der Kolk, director of the Trauma Center in Boston, which is affiliated with the Boston University School of Medicine. "I see a lot of kids mol*sted by pr*ests, people tort*red, people beginning to come back from Ir*q. Maybe in some circles it’s used for political reasons or misused, but it’s a useful diagnosis." "We may not all agree with all the criteria in the diagnosis, but I think in the current debate we’re dealing with backlash," he continued. "There was backlash against Vietnam veterans when PTSD was first used. In the late 80’s and early 90’s there was backlash against research on sex*al ab*se, and in the 90’s there was controversy about fals* memory. There are cycles of trauma and then cycles of denial." Mental health experts like Dr. van der Kolk say the term post-traumatic stress disorder is narrowly and conservatively defined, at least by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, the b*ble for psychologists and psychiatrists that officially lists mental disorders. The diagnosis and its treatments are supported by decades of thorough research, they add, even though clinicians can rightly debate just what constitutes trauma. PTSD was first officially diagnosed by the American Psychiatric Association in 1980 after trauma symptoms were seen in returning Vietnam W*r veterans. Before that, terms like shell shock and battle fatigue were used. The acceptance of that diagnosis – like many others – reflected broader social concerns. Homos*xuality, for instance, was once officially considered a disorder. And only recently have the severe mood swings associated with some women’s menstru*l cycles received an official diagnosis. Yet Richard J. McNally, a professor of psychology at Harvard and the author of "Remembering Trauma" (Harvard University Press, 2003), argues that the definition of trauma is still being molded by "political and social forces." "One unintended consequence of peace and prosperity is a liberalized definition of what counts as a traumatic stressor," Mr. McNally writes. "The threshold for classifying an experience as traumatic is lower when times are good. In the absence of catastrophic stressors such as w*r, specialists in traumatic stress turn their attention elsewhere, discovering new sources of victims or hitherto unrecognized trauma." "Remembering Trauma" cites studies that sound alarms about the use of the PTSD diagnosis in civil litigation, with lawyers coaching clients on symptoms and people going to court claiming PTSD from fender benders, being fired from a job or living within a few miles of an … read more »
Response:
Ross E. Cheit, an associate professor of political science and public policy at Brown University, is dismissive of Mr. McNally’s evidence, saying it is too anecdotal and fails to establish an objective criteria for overuse of PTSD. A specialist in the law and politics of child sex*al ab*se, Mr. Cheit said that while the legal definition of abuse has become broader, dayc*re scandals and controversies about recovered memory have weakened child victims’ credibility in court.
Professor Cheit’s work is suspect in more ways than one, apparently. In the "when you’re carrying a hammer, everything looks like a nail" department, here’s a peek into an interdepartmental conflict by somebody who knows him, apparently. It’s pretty embarrassing: Excerpted from http://www.thomasscoville.com/borderlands.htm : [the context is an account by the spouse of a colleague of professor Cheit's who was falsely accused of domestic abuse, whom Dr. Cheit subsequently dropped like a hot potato and refused communication, presumably for reasons of tenure politics.] "The silence is so, so telling. Ross, for instance, is an extremely vigorous crusader for the rights of the sexually abused, and for the validation of Recovered Memory Syndrome. A lawyer by training, he raves about political corruption in his home state, and sends graduate students on research missions to dig up evidence on corruption and malfeasance in the state legislature. "During this dark chapter [], I’d secretly hoped that Ross would similarly try to disambiguate [the] scandal and advocate for his colleague by trying to dig up any dirt on me to support the hypothesis that I’m some horrible sociopath ? I mean, that’s his M.O. and metier, right? Surely there would be court records, arrests, restraining orders, or people in my past who would come forward with accounts. Surely Ross could find them ? casually, in fact; he’s accomplished at it. "My hope still stands. Ross, if you’re out there, come after me. Do your worst. Otherwise, I’ll take your silence as an admission you [] were wrong, until you assert otherwise. Because your silence is way, way out of character. It certainly looks curious, doesn’t it? ? that you’re wildly vocal and vigorous in your advocacy of people who have made difficult-to-prove claims of sexual abuse victimhood and recovered memory, while being agnostic and silent on the difficult-to-prove claims of those falsely accused of abuse. Apparently, not all forms of abuse are created equal in your psychological cosmology. It makes me think that your academic work is tainted ? purely the working-out your own issues around your sexual abuse and recovered memory, re-labeled as ?scholarship.? "
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