How Does CBD Help With PTSD?
Most combat veterans and service members suffer from some form of PTSD. Current treatment options combine various forms of therapy with high doses of prescription medications. While PTSD medications can offer temporary relief, their long lists of side effects often lead to other complications.
Studies show that CBD may be one of the best ways to address the root cause of PTSD, as well as to help soothe the symptoms. It has zero harmful side effects and has incredible physical and mental health benefits.
In this article, we'll discuss the 5 most common PTSD symptoms that CBD has shown to help with.
Before we begin, let’s break down a couple facts about PTSD, as well as the most common symptoms.
1 in 5 veterans are diagnosed with PTSD. There are also many who don’t get diagnosed but still suffer from symptoms like anxiety, depression, and substance abuse.
PTSD isn’t limited to service members. Victims of sexual assault, domestic abuse, accidents, loss of a loved one, or survivors of natural disasters can suffer from varying degrees of PTSD.
Four common symptoms of PTSD are:
- Flashbacks or nightmares about the traumatic event that disrupt your quality of life and sleep.
- Avoidance and shying away from things that remind you of the trauma.
- Heightened anxiety, causing you to constantly feel on edge.
- Overwhelming feelings of fear, guilt, or detachment that make it hard to concentrate and even harder to enjoy life.
The treatment options currently available aren’t always effective and can cause a host of side effects. They’re also designed to dull the symptoms and don’t treat the real issue behind the symptoms. For example, SSRIs only work for about 60% of patients, and only half of those ever make a complete recovery. Other drugs that are commonly used, such as antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications, can help to numb some PTSD symptoms, but do nothing to target the fear-conditioned memories at the root of the problem.
It’s time for a natural, effective solution!
Luckily, there is mounting evidence that CBD can help address the most common symptoms of PTSD and help those affected experience a better quality of life.
Here are five revolutionary ways recent research has shown CBD can help people with PTSD:
1. MOOD & MENTAL STATE
CBD can help fight the depressive mood swings that plague people with PTSD. It does this by increasing the levels of anandamide, a natural antidepressant produced by your body.
Studies have found that people suffering from PTSD have much lower levels of anandamide in their brains than others, which can make your brain focus on fear and anxiety instead of happiness.
Here are some other ways CBD boosts your mood and your brain’s ‘happy chemicals’ while turning down your ‘sad chemicals’
2. INSOMNIA
Sleep issues are a huge part of PTSD. Whether you have trouble getting to sleep, staying asleep, or suffering from nightmares, CBD can help.
CBD helps stabilize sleep patterns and increase sleep quality, combats insomnia caused by anxiety and PTSD, and fights night terrors and other sleep disturbances.
3. ANXIETY
If you suffer from PTSD, even the simplest day-to-day tasks may be nerve-wracking. For military veterans, years of living in a state of high alert in high-risk environments make it difficult to adjust to regular life.
CBD has shown to be effective against many different kinds of anxiety. It decreases activity in the amygdala - your brain’s fear center and helps return your baseline stress levels back to normal. Even better, regular doses of CBD seem to be permanently effective against long-term anxiety.
Taking CBD daily can combat the long-lasting effects of chronic stress-induced anxiety, which is basically a fancy way of describing PTSD.
4. FEAR CONDITIONING
Fear conditioning is when your brain associates a traumatic event from your past with a neutral event, like a sound, place, smell, or taste.
Studies have shown that CBD can be helpful for overcoming fear conditioning symptoms. It helps you combat the automatic fear response your brain has associated with the memory.
Over the long-term, your brain can learn to form new memory pathways that are free from fear and stress. You may still remember the bad events, but it won’t haunt you as much, and you won’t automatically freeze, sweat, lose control, or react violently.
5. ADDICTION
Alcohol and drug abuse are common among veterans and adults with PTSD. The trauma can be overwhelming, and many end up grasping at any straw they can find in an effort to numb the rough edges. Right now, there are 14 pre-clinical studies showing how CBD can help fight various addictions -- and it’s all good news so far.
All the completed studies have found that CBD helps fight addiction, whether involving opioids, psychostimulants, nicotine, or alcohol. It also reduces the effects of intoxication and withdrawal and lessens your desire for the addictive substance.
CONCLUSION
While there is no cure for PTSD, CBD is a promising solution to help our service members heal and live a normal life. By using CBD in your daily life, it can help control mood swings, promote quality sleep and pain management, manage anxiety, and help free you from the fear associated with bad memories, making it a safe, alternative way to combat PTSD.
CBD has been shown to be effective in fighting addiction, but it isn’t itself addictive. It also has zero harmful side effects, is federally legal, doesn’t register on a drug test, and doesn’t conflict with most medications. There is also a lot of evidence that CBD can help control other common symptoms in people with PTSD, like chronic pain and inflammation.
CBD can work for you whether you’re a service member or are suffering from the after-effects of any traumatic experience.
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