When A Child’s Trauma Creates A Parent’s PTSD

Before I was affected by post-traumatic stress disorder, my understanding of the condition was fairly limited. I thought it had to do with physical attacks against your body and how your brain responds. I never realized that a child’s medical trauma could create PTSD in a parent’s body. My introduction to parenting and PTSD came simultaneously when my son was born 15 weeks prematurely, weighing one pound and four ounces.

PTSD Flashbacks

Many people associate PTSD with a grizzled Vietnam veteran, seated at the bar with a beer and a cigarette. A car passing by suddenly backfires and he yells, ducking underneath his chair. The loud bang reminds him of grenades, napalm or some other horror of war. We generally imagine triggers and flashbacks as two obvious points in your memory map connected by an obvious line. However in my case, PTSD was a much more insidious creature.

The worst flashbacks came unexpectedly when I was doing something mundane, like opening the bathroom door. I wouldn’t see the toilet or sink, but a dark empty theater. The blank screen before me began to replay one of the worst moments of my life. Today’s feature presentation: finding out my baby will be delivered 15 weeks early. I felt the furious burn of the epidural needle in my spine, the glare of the lights, and the sickening fear in my gut just as strongly as I had the day it happened. I couldn’t escape until I’ve watched the entire movie.

Sensory Triggers in PTSD

For me the trauma stems from my son’s 138 day stay in the NICU. There are so many other sources of trauma that can result in parents ending up with this disorder. My close friends are suffering because their child’s hospitalized fighting cancer. For others it may be an unexpected miscarriage, or a car accident resulting in injury. In the scariest moments of your life, all of your senses become incredibly sensitive. This is a human instinct, written into your DNA to protect you from danger. Your smell, vision and hearing become clearer. Time slows down to give you a better chance to react and save your life. This is helpful if a train is about to hit you but when the trauma is happening to your child, your heightened senses may be more confusing than useful.

When it got ugly in the NICU, my adrenaline levels would skyrocket. My body told me to either run away or fight the next thing that walked by. But I froze, watching a team of doctors and nurses surround my child to care for him because I could not. My heightened senses weren’t serving anyone in this situation. How did it help my son to suddenly smell hand sanitizer like I just had a bucket of it poured over me? Or when I heard the thunderous stomps of sneakers on tile as the respiratory team ran over when the code was called? Because we’re evolved to remember danger and learn from it, my brain created these associations to prepare itself for another traumatic episode.

Knowledge is Healing

So how can you heal if you think you have PTSD? How can you help a parent you know who’s going through it? One of the first and most important things you can do is to educate yourself on this disorder. There are a number of reputable websites that provide information and screening for PTSD. Knowing what symptoms to look for can help you find the most effective way to treat this. For some parents PTSD is temporary and improves with the better health of their child. The more I am able to experience non-life threatening encounters with my sensory triggers (hospital hand sanitizer and the sound of sneakers on tile), the less I feel like something bad is about to happen.

In the hospital setting, doctors and nurses are often the first to witness signs of PTSD in the parents and caregivers of their patients. Their primary focus should be on the child, however it is important that they make parents aware of the resources available to them, such as support groups and social workers. For parents struggling with PTSD it is important to share what is going on with people in their support system. There’s large communities on social media for parents of children who’ve suffered medical trauma. Reading others’ stories, sharing their own struggles, and connecting with people who understand their situation is crucial for emotional healing.

During the hardest days, I just wanted someone to tell me that “It’s okay if you’re not okay right now. It won’t last forever.” In your darkest hours, the ones who love you the most will tell you to be strong. You already are strong, even when you’re crying, shaking, and can’t take another setback. It takes all the love and patience in the world to parent a healthy child. And even more for a child with medical challenges. If PTSD taught me anything about motherhood, it’s that my son is truly an extension of myself. I can feel his pain and joy in my own body, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world.