The Trouble with Trauma

Posted on Mon 29th Oct, 2018 @ 10:38pm by Commander Paul Graves PsyD
Edited on Mon 2nd Sep, 2019 @ 8:37am

268 words; about a 1 minute read

(Encrypted for health information privacy.)

Today I was at last able to have an extended conversation with Brooklyn. I'm glad I did. She's experiencing post-traumatic stress from her encounter with the enemy pilot. The situation is more delicate than usual because she's a friend and because she doesn't want to officially undergo counseling. I'm going to do my utmost to show her that she doesn't need to hide. She's not the only SFMC fighter pilot who's ever undergone this sort of thing and resumed flying; it needn't mean the end of her flying career.

She needs, I think, a full course of cognitive behavioral therapy, desensitization therapy, and some medication. I have certification in psychopharmacology, so I can prescribe for her if need be--but that would go into her EMR file--I am not about to prescribe for anyone under the table. Because of that, she's refused any prescription medication for this. I'll talk to her about non-prescription, OTC things she might try to relieve anxiety. For instance, if she's having any kind of sleep disturbance, a neural suppressor might help.

Anyway, I will wait to see what the flight recorder from Brooklyn's fighter craft yields. I don't know if I will learn much from his threats, and I don't know how useful knowing what happened during their interaction will be to reducing Brooklyn's anxiety disorder. It's more practical to focus on easing her fear than to dig into the why of it. We can go in circles forever, trying to answer the question of why. The thing to focus on is that she fears.

 

RSS Feed