Mental And Emotional Preparedness And Resilience: Empowering Ourselves Against Disasters and Trauma
September Is National Preparedness Month
September is National Preparedness Month. Most content related to National Preparedness Month focuses on physical disaster preparedness. Companies that sell emergency food and supplies usually have big sales this month. Ready.gov generally focuses on physical preparations as well. Physical resilience and preparedness, food supplies, emergency communications, first aid kits, all of these things are important and are addressed regularly. One thing that is often neglected in preparedness discussions is the concept of emotional and psychological preparedness and response. When disaster strikes, physical assistance may be only part of what survivors need. “Psychological First Aid” for disaster-induced stress and trauma may also be required.
Trauma can result from a variety of causes including emergencies such as natural and man-made disasters. Trauma is a very individual thing. Two people can experience the same event, and end up with very different consequences. One may be relatively unscarred from the event, and another might be scarred with PTSD or other mental and emotional health disorders.
Disaster Related Trauma
“Traumatization occurs when both internal and external resources are inadequate to cope with external threat.”
Bessel Van der Kolk, The Body Keeps The Score
Disasters can be particularly difficult because they tend to traumatize large populations of people at once, and the trauma can be significant, even devastating. In a disaster, the resources and ability of a community are overwhelmed and taxed beyond their capacity. Traumatization in massive events like disasters, terror attacks, or war are not always based on what people experience directly, but can also be based on what they see and hear others around them experience.
Like many causes of trauma, disasters can be sudden and overwhelming. The most immediate and typical reaction to a disaster is shock, which often manifests as emotional numbness or denial at first. Shock can then give way to other intense emotions that often include anxiety, guilt, and depression.
People might have lost friends, family, pets, their homes, businesses, or places of employment in the disaster. As a result, they may feel helpless. Some people may have to live in camps or shelters amongst strangers for extended periods. However, living with other survivors can also offer opportunities to connect, talk about the event with others, and help to reframe the event. Helping others can reduce feelings of helplessness, and may help emotional healing.
Natural disasters can cause people to feel disempowered, or to feel betrayed by their god, which can result in a loss of faith. Making peace with their spiritual situation can be a step toward healing and regaining faith. This can be important because, for many, faith can help them heal.
Healing From Trauma
Generally speaking, people come at the concept of trauma from one of two perspectives. Either you are expected to simply “get over it” without much time or effort, or you will be forever broken and traumatized and healing isn’t possible. The truth is most kinds of mental and emotional trauma can be overcome or at least managed, but there may be some traumas that are much more significant and realistically may not be able to be effectively managed or overcome. Generally speaking, significant trauma can be dealt with, but sometimes it takes years of therapy in the forms of counselling, physical treatments, and medications. Many people are working to understand how trauma really affects people, how to heal, how to deal with what can’t be healed, and what the effects of trauma are.
One of the most important ways to be prepared for future trauma is to deal with your past traumas now, so when a new traumatic event occurs, you’re better able to deal with it. Potentially traumatic events will happen throughout life. It’s not a matter of if, but when, and how often. Some people are more prone to becoming traumatized than others. If you are resilient and healthy mentally and emotionally, you are less likely to be traumatized.
Counselling helps many people to deal with trauma they have experienced. Studies are showing that MDMA, known commonly as Ecstasy, when used as part of a counselling regiment has breakthrough potential in the treatment of PTSD, and other drugs such as Psilocybin, the active compound in Magic Mushrooms are also showing promise as mental health treatments.
Preparing For Traumatic Experiences
A more specific way to prepare yourself mentally, physically, and emotionally is to practice, and there are many different ways to do so. One way to practice and become more familiar with emergency disaster response is to volunteer to participate in drills and practice or training events. Various groups will hold practices and drills. FEMA, state agencies, local schools, and businesses are just a few examples of organizations that may hold emergency drills in your area. Another way is to run emergency drills in your family or business. In your down time you can do mental drills, thought experiments to consider what you would do in a specific situation. Attending training classes is another way you can prepare yourself for emergencies. There are many people and organizations that offer First Aid and CPR training. Others go further and offer Tactical Emergency Casualty Care (TECC) classes. Trainings like these not only help you learn what to do in an emergency, but they will also help you develop muscle memory which will help you be more prepared physically to provide the care and support you were trained on. They can also help you be more resilient. There are a wide variety of skills that you can learn and practice to help yourself be prepared. There are classes, books, and videos that will help you learn what you want to. As the old adage says, “Knowledge is power”. The more you know, the more you have practiced, the more empowered you will be when disaster strikes, and the more resilient you will be in dealing with that trauma.
Some of the ways we can prepare physiologically for trauma and increase our resiliency against physical symptoms of trauma are to:
- Rest more, or at least try to rest
- Eat well balanced, regular meals, even if you don’t feel like eating
- Stay active physically and mentally
- Keep busy and fighting boredom
- Reestablish a normal schedule, or as close to normal as you can, as soon as possible
Psychological First Aid
“The effects of unresolved trauma can be devastating. It can affect our habits and outlook on life, leading to addictions and poor decision-making. It can take a toll on our family life and interpersonal relationships. It can trigger real physical pain, symptoms, and disease. And it can lead to a range of self-destructive behaviors.”
Peter A Levine, A Tiger Shows The Way
The following are some ways to help provide someone the initial comfort and support they need in taking the first steps towards recovery:
- Talk to people if they are willing to talk to you. Encourage them to talk about their feelings as well as physical needs. People need to know someone cares and wants to know how they are doing, physically as well as emotionally. If someone has something to say, take the time to listen
- Show through your response that you understand people’s concerns or worries and that such feelings are to be expected. Stephen R Covey observed, “Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.” Immediately after a traumatic event, when people are still trying to process what has happened, they need someone to listen to them and understand them, not to try to “fix” things or hear the perfect response intended to make everything all better. Sometimes people just need to talk and process things verbally as much as they can. In these instances, people may just need you to listen and not say anything at all
- Respect people’s confidence. Don’t repeat personal information to others. Everyone has the right to confidentiality. If possible, you should have someone’s consent to share information about them. If consent is not possible, or has not been given, you should only share “need to know” information necessary for health, safety, and life.
- Spend time with traumatized people if they are comfortable with it. Spending time with people is another way to show them you care about them. Knowing someone cares may make it more likely someone will talk about how they are feeling instead of bottling up their emotions
- Reassure people they are safe. In the aftermath of a disaster, people may need frequent reassurances, especially if they are struggling to cope with the trauma they have experienced
- Offer assistance even if people have not asked for help, unless they have said they do not want help. Remember though, people have the right to refuse medical treatment and their rights should be respected. If someone is unable to consent to medical treatment, the concept of implied consent says it is generally safe to assume they would consent to be help if they were able to. Implied consent is very limited, and should only be applied to that which is specifically necessary for a person’s health, safety, and life.
- Don’t take others’ anger or other feelings personally. Most likely they are not mad or upset at you. Different people experience, and react, to things differently. Some people respond through anger or lashing out. Others withdraw. Give people time, and they will usually calm down and act more normally. Some will even apologise for lashing out at you. Be gracious, and forgive. Don’t let someone’s emotional reaction during a traumatic crisis ruin a relationship, current or future.
- Although it’s both tempting and easy to say, don’t tell people they are “lucky it wasn’t worse” it usually won’t help, and could make things worse. Instead, sympathize with them and that a traumatic event has occurred. Let them know you want to understand and assist them if they will let you.
People who are experiencing or have experienced trauma often need more patience and understanding than usual. Everyone deserves to be treated with patience, love, kindness, and respect, and treating people this way is even more important when they are dealing with trauma. Despite what we sometimes see in movies and television where people need to be slapped, hit, or yelled at to bring them back to their senses and out of a depressed or distracted state, treating someone like that would do far more harm than good, and would likely lead to more violence, anger, frustration, grief, and pain. Understanding, patience, kindness, respect, and love are key in helping someone deal with their trauma.
Remember to do what you need to, in order to take care of yourself first. If you aren’t in a healthy place mentally and emotionally yourself, it’s much more difficult to help others.
Disasters and traumatic events are often unavoidable. Although we may not know where or when they may happen, they are events we can plan and prepare for. It may be easier in some ways to prepare physically for disasters and traumatic events, but we can also prepare mentally and emotionally. When we do so, it makes us mentally and emotionally stronger, healthier, and more resilient. It also supports our physical preparations. Traumatic events and disasters will happen, but when we prepare for them, we increase our resilience and empower ourselves against the trauma so we can heal, and not let the trauma have power over us.
Garrett Leeds is the founder of the Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness Project
