The Impacts of Trauma on Children
Even though adults work hard to keep children safe, dangerous events still happen.
When a child feels intensely threatened by an event he or she is involved in or witnesses and the event overwhelms the brain's ability to cope, this is considered a trauma.
The types of trauma a child could experience include:
Bullying
Medical trauma
Witnessing domestic violence
Witnessing parental substance abuse
Separation from parent or caregiver
Natural disasters
Car accidents or other accidents
Traumatic grief
Sexual abuse
Physical abuse
Neglect
Children who have experienced trauma may have some symptoms following but the symptoms typically subside on their own. It is completely normal and expected that a child would have some sort of reaction to traumatic events. For a percentage of children, these symptoms can turn into traumatic stress/PTSD. This happens when the symptoms are intense, prolonged and interfere with the child’s daily living.
Symptoms of traumatic stress/PTSD fall into 4 categories:
Avoidance of Reminders
Negative changes in mood and thoughts
Increased arousal and reactivity
Intrusive symptoms
In children’s behaviors this may look like:
Negative beliefs about the world and self (ie; the world is dangerous, it was all my fault)
Hyperactivity/arousal (often misdiagnosed as ADHD if trauma history isn’t explored)
Avoidance of reminders of the trauma and strong physical reactions in the body when around reminders
Trouble sleeping
Aggression, extreme temper tantrums
Constant memories, pictures, sounds of what happened coming into their minds
Children are RESILIENT!
One of the reasons I love working with children is their resiliency. Healing from traumatic events is possible and help is out there for children who have experienced or witnessed a traumatic event. At Child Therapy Solutions, we offer Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) an evidenced based trauma treatment to help children and their caregivers overcome the effects of trauma.