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Summary: Some people need residential treatment for trauma because their symptoms become so disruptive they impair their ability to function effectively in important areas of daily life.

Key Points:

  • The symptoms of trauma-related disorders can be more than difficult: they can keep a person from meeting their essential life responsibilities related to work, school, and family.
  • When symptoms of trauma escalate, it has a negative downstream effect on other mental health issues.
  • Escalating trauma symptoms can increase anxiety about work and relationships.
  • Escalating trauma symptoms can increase depressive behaviors such as withdrawal from social and family activities and self-isolation.
  • Evidence-based treatment for trauma-related disorders is effective, and can help people manage symptoms and return to full functioning across important life domains.

Trauma: Symptoms, Consequences, and Treatment: How Does it All Fit Together?

Here’s a rule of thumb when considering mental health treatment, which can help us understand why some people need residential treatment for trauma:

When symptoms of a mental health disorder make life unmanageable and make full and productive participation in daily activities impossible or nearly impossible, then residential treatment can help a person regain balance, restore functional capacity, and rediscover their ability to live and thrive independently.

It’s important to understand that mental health disorders that reach the threshold for clinical diagnosis rarely resolve on their own, without professional help and support. In most cases, symptoms get worse over time, and the resulting behavior reinforces a downward trajectory. In depression, people stop doing things they love, which exacerbates their depressive symptoms. People with anxiety may become more agitated, on edge, and irritable, which can cause problems with people that can offer help and support, such as family and friends.

The consequences of untreated trauma-related disorders such as PTSD include, but are not limited to:

  • Chronic, worsening depressive mood/sadness
  • Chronic, worsening anxiety
  • Aggression
  • Anger outbursts, tantrums
  • Frequent, persistent self-isolation
  • Increased risk of alcohol use disorder and or substance use disorder (AUD/SUD)
  • Elevated risk of non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI), i.e. self-harm
  • Increased incidence of suicidality, i.e. thinking about, planning, and/or attempting suicide
  • Difficulties with family, peer, and intimate/partner relationships
  • Declining performance in school and at work
  • Increased incidence of chronic physical disease
  • Increased risk of co-occurring mental health disorders
  • Impaired cognition: problems with memory, decision-making, attention

When PTSD goes untreated, the pattern we describe above – a downward spiral of negative reinforcement – can make all symptoms more intense, more severe, and more frequent. This causes more disruption in daily life, and when the level of disruption becomes so extreme that meeting even the most basic responsibilities of daily life a challenge, residential treatment can help stop the downward spiral, halt the escalation, and help a person get on the path to recovery.

Why Would Residential Treatment Help?

During residential treatment, your daily responsibilities shift from commitments and obligations to other people to a commitment to yourself. Rather than being preoccupied with getting up and out the door to work or school – with everything that entails – you’re preoccupied with getting up, eating a healthy breakfast provided by the treatment center, and getting to your first organized treatment activity of the day.

Here’s what a day in residential treatment might be like:

A Day In the Life: Residential Treatment

7:30: Breakfast provided by treatment center staff

8:30: Group or individual activity, such as yoga, exercise, mediation, journaling.

9:30: Group or individual therapy

10:30: Group or individual therapy

12:00: Healthy lunch provided by treatment center staff

<<<<<<<< Downtime for reflection/recovery homework/naps >>>>>>>>

2:00: Afternoon group: education, process, skill building

3:00: Individual therapy/counseling/psychiatry

4:00: Afternoon recovery activities: education, exercise, music, art

6:00: Healthy dinner provided by treatment center staff

7:30: Evening group

8:30: Recovery homework, reading, reflection, downtime

10:00: Early to bed, get good rest for tomorrow

If you’re in treatment for a trauma related disorder, your treatment plan will likely include:

Trauma-Focused Psychotherapy:

(Most often CBT + One Type of Exposure Therapy)
  • Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)
  • Cognitive processing therapy (CPT)
  • Prolonged exposure therapy (PE)
  • Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR)
  • Cognitive therapy for PTSD (CT-PTSD)

Educational Workshops:

  • The science of trauma and PTSD
  • Stress hormones and PTSD
  • Your nervous system and PTSD
  • Healthy communication

Skill Building:

  • Recognizing and managing triggers
  • Stress management
  • Distress tolerance

Lifestyle Adjustments:

  • Healthy eating
  • Exercise and activity
  • Sleep hygiene

In most cases, medication is not a first-line treatment for trauma-related disorders. However, when clinical anxiety and/or clinical depression co-occur alongside PTSD, antidepressants or anxiolytics may be part of the treatment plan. Or, for severe and treatment resistant PTSD, patients may engage in off label treatment with new and emerging medications such as MDMA or psilocybin. They may also receive brain stimulation treatments like transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) or deep brain stimulation (DBS). I addition, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the U.S. National Center for PTSD indicates the following four new and emerging therapeutic approaches are effective in reducing the symptoms of PTSD:

So far, we’ve discussed why some people need residential treatment for trauma, shared what a day in residential treatment might be like, and listed the types of treatment they can expect in residential treatment for PTSD. We’ll close this article with our observations on the benefits of residential treatment we haven’t expanded on yet.

Time in a Judgment-Free, Empathetic Environment Designed for Healing and Growth

We mention this briefly above: when you commit to residential treatment, you commit to your own personal healing and growth. If you have an untreated trauma-related disorder, you may experience the following:

  • Symptoms getting worse
  • Coping skills not keeping up with worsening symptoms
  • Worry about getting fired because you can’t focus at work and you’re scared your boss notices
  • Problems in your relationships because of increasing anxiety, hyperarousal, or the opposite: increasing depressive states and sadness

When you decide to engage in residential treatment, you can take steps to resolve those problems and challenges. Please understand – and believe us when we say – that treatment for unresolved trauma and PTSD works. When you spend time in treatment with a therapist, counselor, and/or psychiatrist you know and trust, you can process the memories that trigger the emotions responsible for most of your symptoms.

How?

Consider the sample schedule we shared above and think about what it means for you. It means that when you get up in the morning, your responsibilities for that day include one thing and one thing only: healing.

You don’t have to think about work responsibilities, family commitments, school aspirations, or anything else. Your job, during residential treatment, is to get at the root of your trauma, identify it – memories, emotions, and all – and work with your therapist and recovery peers to process and resolve it.

When you do that, here’s what can happen.

Evidence-Based Treatment for PTSD: Outcomes

  • Reduced symptoms: flashbacks, avoidance, hypervigilance, anger, depression, isolation, anxiety may all become less severe, less frequent, less intense, less disturbing, and less disruptive.
    • Some people report treatment eliminates their symptoms completely
  • Improved performance at work and school
  • Improved relationships
  • Restored concentration, memory, decision-making

When you take the time to process your trauma, you can change your life. Not every person who seeks treatment will entirely eliminate all their symptoms, but evidence indicates that in most cases, patients can restore balance to their lives and minimize emotional distress and functional impairment. Significant symptom reduction supported by improved coping skills enables people who engage in residential treatment for trauma to lead full and productive lives not dominated by their symptoms, but rather guided by their goals for life and personal concept of health and wellbeing.

Finding Help: Resources

If you or someone you know needs residential treatment for PTSD, please contact us here at Crownview Psychiatric Institute: we have a residential treatment program that can help. In addition, you can find support through the following online resources:

About Angus Whyte

Angus Whyte has an extensive background in neuroscience, behavioral health, adolescent development, and mindfulness, including lab work in behavioral neurobiology and a decade of writing articles on mental health and mental health treatment. In addition, Angus brings twenty years of experience as a yoga teacher and experiential educator to his work for Crownview. He’s an expert at synthesizing complex concepts into accessible content that helps patients, providers, and families understand the nuances of mental health treatment, with the ultimate goal of improving outcomes and quality of life for all stakeholders.