Neurofeedback Therapy And Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

While the thought of life without fear may sound appealing, fear, and the thoughts and feelings that accompany it, have probably been responsible for saving more lives than anything else you can imagine.

No doubt most of us would like to think that the real reason more people don't pull out a gun and start shooting when someone cuts them off in traffic is that their own moral compass prevents it. However, more times than we would care to admit, the gun is not fired because someone fears the consequences of doing so.

The truth is, fear serves a very important purpose, at least in terms of our survival, and to forever banish fear from our lives would certainly result in a much earlier demise than necessary. Fear, at the right time and place, and at the appropriate level, should be appreciated as a guardian that protects us from harm.

However, when fearful sensations are experienced at a time, place, and intensity that are not appropriate, these feelings lose their usefulness. The lives of those who are at the mercy of such inordinate fear can feel like a relentless cycle of terror. Sadly, thousands of men and women who have proudly served in the Armed Forces have returned, and continue to return from the Middle East, suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD.

Fortunately for many of them, neurofeedback therapy offers a way to allow a patient to re-process the memory (or memories) responsible for their debilitating symptoms. Each time a sufferer of PTSD recalls a certain event, it is as if they are right back in the experience again. Using neurofeedback, clinicians can help a patient to experience disturbing memories from an emotionally detached place, almost as if they are reading about someone else's experience.

Think about some of the violent crimes you have read about in the newspaper, or have seen on television. As sad as it is to see or read stories about these things, you can do so with a relative sense of comfort and security. Neurofeedback therapy helps PTSD sufferers to view their own troubling experiences in the same way.

How does neurofeedback work? Through a process that actually retrains the brain to use certain brain waves more than others, neurofeedback therapy sessions can enable the patient to re-processes a memory to the point where it ceases to be viewed as "this experience being re-experienced now," and becomes instead, "that experience that I had back then." The memory is still there, but now the patient can simply recall the memory, instead of having to relive it, with all the emotional distress that accompanied the original experience.

Many people have already set themselves free from PTSD with the help of neurofeedback therapy. As the awareness of this beautiful tool reaches even further, we can offer this gift to our returning veterans, allowing them to move beyond the experiences they have endured, and to return once again to a healthy and happy life on the home front.