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DSM-IV
(2) the person's response involved intense fear, helplessness, or horror. Note: In children, this may be expressed instead by disorganized or agitated behavior. B. The traumatic event is persistently reexperienced in one (or more) of the following ways: (1) recurrent and intrusive distressing recollections of the event, including images, thoughts, or perceptions. Note: In young children, repetitive play may occur in which themes or aspects of the trauma are expressed. (2) recurrent distressing dreams of the event. Note: In children, there may be frightening dreams without recognizable content. (3) acting or feeling as if the traumatic event were recurring (includes a sense of reliving the experience, illusions, hallucinations, and dissociative flashback episodes, including those that occur on awakening or when intoxicated). Note: In young children, trauma-specific reenactment may occur. (4) intense psychological distress at exposure to internal or external cues that symbolize or resemble an aspect of the traumatic event. (5) physiological reactivity on exposure to internal or external cues that symbolize or resemble an aspect of the traumatic event C. Persistent avoidance of stimuli associated with the traumatic event. |
Glossary
Helplessness, is common in police work. Because we have to wait until something happens and arrive at the scene afterwards, we may often feel as if we could have, or should have, done more to prevent the death and destruction we often witness. Flashbacks (persistent reexperiencing) a traumatic event can occur while asleep or awake. Irrespective of one's sobriety. Bad dreams can be problematic for officer's as it can feel as though one has lost all control. Violent dreams can cause one to doubt on ability to do the job--loss of sleep can, also, serve to deteriorate one on and off duty performance. Cues can be anything from the smell of gasoline (as from an arson/homicide case), to a child (one that resembles a victim with whom one has worked). Physiological reactivity can be things like pulse racing, heart pounding, or head ache, or other, more distressing symptoms, e.g., you think you're having a heart attack. Many officer's use alcohol to avoid having these distressing thoughts or feelings. |
Additional commentary
Flashbacks can also be triggered (see Cues below) by environmental factors. They can be extremely distressing since a trigger can be nearly anything in the officer's environment--more so, because they can happen at ANY time. Cues/triggers: One traffic officer I know would go to great lengths to avoid having to be in the area of a particularly bad accident he had worked. As his anxiety about working in the area increased so did the amount of avoidance he used to deal with the problem. Eventually, he became incapacitated to a point that he couldn't even get close to his patrol car. Another officer with a similar problem, would be violently ill when he even drove by the police department. |
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