Car Accident Trauma & PTSD Treatment
Free Treatments with an ICBC Accident Claim
Symptoms of Car Accident Trauma
- Increased general anxiety
- Increased anxiety about driving or vehicles
- Repetitively thinking about the accident
- The accident memory being blurry or unclear
- Feeling depressed or stuck since the accident
- Bad dreams or nightmares
- Hypervigilance, often looking for signs of danger
- Avoidance of driving or the site of the accident
- Chronic irritability or anger since the accident
Our Effective Trauma & PTSD Treatments include:
Neurofeedback
Effective treatment for trauma and PTSD starts with finding ways to stabilize you, as traumatic events are inherently destabilizing. Neurofeedback uses high-tech computer equipment to measure how your brain and nervous system are functioning, and then helps to shift the state of your brain so you can feel more calm and balanced. Clients usually start to notice improvements in their anxiety, stress trauma, or other symptoms within the first 5 sessions.
Traumatic Memory Processing
Somatic Experiencing
Somatic Experiencing encourages us to focus on our bodies and feelings as an essential element of reprocessing traumatic memories.While our minds often get stuck in looping thoughts, our bodies actually have the capacity to heal from traumatic events. Since trauma is a regular fact of life (think of nature videos), it makes sense that evolution might have given us a way to heal from traumatic events.
With Somatic Experiencing we start to pay attention to sensations, like the tension and tightness in your shoulders, chest, and/or stomach. You may also notice feelings like sadness, frustration, anger, or numbness. You may also notice moments of relief and relaxation. Together you can learn how to experience all of these as waves of energy that can often pass through. As we help you to revisit the traumatic memory and work through these associated sensations and feelings, the memory will become healthily integrated into your brain just like the rest of your memories.
EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)
EMDR is an evidence based therapy that utilizes eye movements to help resolve traumatic memories. While using eye movements for therapy may sound strange, we find strong evidence for this connection in our sleep. It is during the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) stage of sleep that we dream and the brain is focused on reprocessing our mental and emotional experiences.
During a typical EMDR therapy session for Car Accident Trauma Treatment, the therapist guides a process where the client thinks about the accident memory, and then shifts to guided side-to-side eye movements. During this process, clients are often able to reprocess their emotions and the traumatic memory more quickly.