Recently, there’s been a stream of compelling research suggesting that untreated PTSD and trauma can raise the risk of cognitive decline and dementia later in life.
Chayil Champion points to a few of those studies, including a recent study which linked middle-aged women experiencing PTSD with significantly worse cognitive decline than those without symptoms of PTSD.
Another, recent study of Vietnam veterans found that PTSD symptom severity was associated with accelerated cognitive decline.
And another study found that patients with PTSD were 2x likelier to develop dementia than those without PTSD.
The strongest study of studies yet suggests that there is a strong association between PTSD and increased risk of all-cause dementia.
So the link is pretty undeniable.
So why the relationship?
A number of studies point to key mechanisms linking Alzheimers Disease and dementia with chronic stress, including neuroinflammation, elevated neuropathological markers, and metabolic disorders.
While scientists continue to explore the why, there’s very little question as to the broad association.
Enter UCLA professor April Thames, whose new research suggests that those with untreated trauma early in life also experience greater risk developing earlier cognitive decline as they grow older.
Interestingly, one of the coping mechanisms for such victims is the tendency to dissociate earlier in life.
“For example, let’s say somebody’s talking to you, but you’re thinking about something else going on,” Dr. Thames explains. “You’re not going to take in everything that person says. So later on, if you’re asked about that conversation, you’re going to forget.”
The tendency to dissociate can lead to significant memory issues. Clinically, Dr. Thames has observed a worrying trend: “Sometimes, as people get to that middle age, you know, late 40s, early 50s, they report forgetting pretty significant events that occurred.”
Now my concern in posting studies like this is that those with PTSD may suddenly begin worrying about their risk of developing dementia, which only adds to an increased mental burden.
However… the greater concern is that those with PTSD adopt a “Yeah, it sucks, but you press on” American mentality or the “Keep calm and carry on” stoicism in the popular imagination of UK culture (and, really, we know the ubiquity of that phrase here in the states).
That’s all fine and well, until you consider that it leaves you at a proven risk of not being fine and well, sooner and more significantly, as you age.
As we all know, dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease can be devastating for those suffering from it and their caregivers helping treat it.
And the process of cognitive decline itself can lead to increased depression, anxiety etc., which only compounds the trauma of the cognitive decline.
Thus, the take-home message for you, for me — if you have PTSD or think you might have it, treating it now has innumerable benefits both in the present and the future.
I particularly worry about the church and its rather quiet, at best, and hostile, at worst, approach to PTSD.
There’s a pernicious and terrible phenomenon of “mental strength” culture within the church, wherein diseases of “mental weakness” are dismissed as either a) fanciful creations of secular science or b) inadequate spiritual formation.
I’ve known a number of Christians who I thought “knew better,” but scoffed at the idea of the long-lasting effects of trauma and the very idea of trauma itself — even when they acknowledged depression as a real thing.
“We all go through tough times,” they say.
Well, it’s not for laymen to distinguish between “tough times” and trauma, and any attempt to do so is naive, arrogant, and puts those suffering in danger.
“Strengthening” these “brethren” to, essentially, “get over it” isn’t the work of Christ that Paul talks about.
It’s unwittingly the work of the enemy who seeks to kill and destroy because we know that Satan doesn’t give up on destroying once you’ve become a Christian. He wants to kill and destroy your joy, your sense of life – even if he can’t get to your soul.
I’m not making that charge lightly against those in the church scoffing at PTSD. Their attitude sadly destroys lives.
It’s time for the church to wake up and start treating PTSD as a real thing, trauma as a profound and life-altering event, and urge those suffering to seek professional help.
That’s the compassionate thing to do. That’s the Christian thing to do.
Here’s a good primer on PTSD, if you think you might be suffering from it, as well as the classic book, explaining the science of trauma and its effects on the body.
Also…
Find a psychiatrist here.
Find a therapist here.
[Photo: Free, Pexels].
