Abusive relationships: Is a new category for traumatization needed?

Abstract

The concept of a spectrum of posttraumatic disorders has been postulated by a variety of major contributors to the field of psychotraumatology. Although Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is one trauma-based mental health disorder, there are other posttraumatic illnesses that do not qualify for PTSD, nor are they accurately described by other diagnostic categories in the DSM-IV. The present paper proposes and delineates a new syndrome, entitled Posttraumatic Relationship Syndrome (PTRS), which is a function of the experience of trauma in the context of an emotionally intimate relationship. It differs from PTSD in four fundamental ways: (1) the nature of the Stressor criterion; (2) the response to the Stressor; (3) the inclusion of a category of relational symptoms; and (4) the way of coping with the trauma (i.e., it lacks the emotional numbing and avoidance of stimuli associated with the trauma). The latter is the most salient difference as it involves a qualitatively different experience of the “world of trauma”-a primarily conscious experience in PTRS and an often unconscious experience in PTSD.