Deployment Psychology Blog

Today you’re meeting a new patient. They present with a history of combat trauma and report significant sleep disturbances including problems falling asleep because they fear they will have another nightmare.
This may feel familiar to you, and there is a good reason for that. Nightmares are incredibly common after a traumatic event, with some estimates suggesting posttraumatic nightmares occur in 90% of patients with PTSD. 

Trauma. The word means different things to different people and in different circumstances. Sometimes the word refers to intense distress. Sometimes it means actual physical tissue damage. Sometimes it means an emotional upset. And all of these definitions are legitimate and understood in specific contexts