Distress Tolerance Techniques to Reduce Anxiety, Depression and Painful Symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

Traumatic situations have been proven to affect a victim's life for several years following the actual tragedy, and often, even a lifetime afterwards. The pain, shock and other jarring emotions that overwhelm impacted individuals are said to come on with such overbearing intensity that one very often finds his or herself succumbing to desperate measures to avoid the frequent disturbances. Avoidance habits include conscious and sometimes unconscious, or sort of involuntary successions into disassociative states or numbness, panic attacks and even the splitting of one's own personality. Flashbacks are quite common in trauma suffers and so are persistent nightmares or night terrors.

Many people believe that individuals who have experienced extreme trauma should confront their memories and painful emotions head on dealing with them despite the fear it causes, in order to successfully heal. They look at the previously mentioned avoidance techniques as cover ups, per se, that are created by one's own mind and/or body to maybe deter one from facing the supposed crucial matters that haunt them or even redirect the pain elsewhere. Many psychiatric professionals, however, present a seemingly more realistic perspective on the matter and in addition, offer alternatives to treatment and healing.

Crisis survival techniques fall under the category of Distress Tolerance, according to the therapeutic approach, known as Dialectical Behavior Therapy, or DBT. DBT, pioneered by Marsha Linehan and currently practiced by an elite group of licensed therapists all over the world is used primarily for the treatment of a persistent and difficult Psychiatric disorder called Borderline Personality Disorder and is focused on, but not limited to, preventing suicide attempts and other self-harm behavior. The method of DBT therapy, though, is growing increasingly popular among researchers in the field of Psychiatry and Psychology and new light has recently been shed on the specific techniques this school of thought requires and the broad range of issues it may be used for in addition to its original intent.