Experts say there has been an increase in trauma related incidents and for some the pandemic made some situations worse. Bill Owenby with CODAC has been treating patients with trauma for years and he says these days you should pay attention to the signs like a change in diet, increased health problems, new or extreme drug use and irritability.
"We’ve been seeing a lot of isolated traumas, there are a lot of people having difficulties. There’s a lot of the grief and trauma. They’re running into situations that they’ve never run into before with family members, friends, colleagues who are becoming ill and some have even passed as a result of the last year and half due to COVID,” Owenby said.
Owenby says the pandemic hasn’t made the recovery process any easier especially for strained relationships. Handling grief and loss from a distance can be hard for some to process.
“We’ve also seen an increase in a lot of interpersonal violence, domestic violence. Whether people are going into work, or they have lost their job positions. They are home alone more and together and it's causing a lot more conflict,” Owenby said.
According to Qwenby most patients average between 10 to 15 treatments or visits to get their lives back. He also says new research from the Lancent Psychiatry Journal shows that COVID can have lingering effects on the mind.
“People who tested positive for COVID, they had almost twice the rate of developing a mental health disorder. Whether that be anxiety, depression or even insomnia,” Owenby said.
The treatment process can include everything from medication management to employment and therapy.
"We can do things like our group treatment programs one on one therapy even specialized approaches like cognitive processing,” Owenby said.
LINKS TO CODAC--
https://www.codac.org/womens-services/therapy-and-support/ [codac.org]
https://www.codac.org/mens-services/therapy-support/ [codac.org]