Conditions we treat
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
PTSD is what happens when the body and brain keep responding to a past threat as if it’s still happening. With the right treatment, the past can stop running the present.
What is PTSD?
Post-traumatic stress disorder is a response to experiencing or witnessing something deeply threatening — assault, combat, accidents, medical trauma, abuse, the sudden loss of someone close. For most people, the nervous system eventually recalibrates after a traumatic event. When it doesn’t — when memories, reactions, and avoidance patterns persist for more than a month and start to shape daily life — that’s PTSD.
At The Psychiatric Center, we treat PTSD across its many forms — acute PTSD, chronic PTSD, complex PTSD (C-PTSD) stemming from prolonged or repeated trauma, and post-traumatic symptoms that don’t fit the full diagnosis but still interfere with living. We also treat the conditions that often travel with PTSD: depression, anxiety, substance use, sleep disorders, and chronic pain.
PTSD is not a weakness or a failure to move on. It’s a neurobiological response that developed to protect you in a dangerous moment — and with effective, evidence-based treatment, it can be significantly improved or resolved.
How PTSD can present differently
Intrusion and re-experiencing
Unwanted memories, flashbacks, nightmares, and intense physical or emotional reactions to reminders of the trauma. These aren’t choices or imagination — they’re the brain’s alarm system firing in response to cues that feel dangerous, even when the present moment is safe.
Avoidance and numbing
Steering around people, places, conversations, or internal experiences that bring the trauma back. Over time, the world often gets smaller. Emotional numbing — feeling disconnected from people you love or unable to access positive feelings — is also common, and often mistaken for depression.
Hyperarousal and mood changes
Feeling constantly on edge, scanning for threat, easily startled, irritable, having trouble concentrating or sleeping. Persistent negative beliefs about yourself or the world (“I’m permanently damaged,” “no one can be trusted”) often take hold and quietly shape every decision.
Quick facts
- About 6% of US adults experience PTSD in their lifetime
- Women are roughly twice as likely to develop PTSD as men
- Highly responsive to trauma-focused therapies and medication
- Frequently co-occurs with depression, anxiety, and substance use
Related conditions
Our approach
How we treat PTSD
01
Understand
We start with a careful evaluation — your trauma history, current symptoms, sleep, and any co-occurring depression, anxiety, or substance use. We move at your pace; you never have to share more than you’re ready to share.
02
Build a plan
Treatment typically combines trauma-focused therapy with medication where helpful — SSRIs or SNRIs for core PTSD symptoms, and targeted support for sleep, nightmares, or hyperarousal. We tailor the approach to what feels workable for you.
03
Support you
Trauma recovery isn’t linear. We stay with you through setbacks, anniversaries, and the slow work of rebuilding a sense of safety — in your body, in your relationships, and in the world.
Common questions
Frequently asked
Do I have to talk about what happened in detail?
No — not on the first visit, and not at any pace other than your own. Some trauma-focused therapies do involve processing the memory directly, but they’re done gradually and with skill. Other effective approaches focus on the present-day symptoms without detailed retelling. We discuss options before anything begins.
It happened a long time ago — is it too late for treatment?
No. PTSD responds to treatment whether the trauma was recent or decades ago. Many people come in after years of “just dealing with it” and find that symptoms they’d written off as permanent can actually change.
What if I’m not sure what happened counts as trauma?
If something is producing PTSD-like symptoms — intrusive memories, avoidance, hyperarousal, numbing — it doesn’t matter whether it fits a textbook definition of trauma. We’re less interested in categorizing what happened and more interested in how it’s showing up for you now.
Will medication make me feel numb?
That’s a common and reasonable concern. The medications typically used for PTSD — SSRIs, SNRIs, and sleep-specific options — aren’t sedating in the way people often fear. We start low, go slow, and adjust based on how you actually feel.
The past doesn’t have to keep running the show
Call us to schedule an evaluation. Most new patients are seen within one to two weeks.