Self-compassion and post-traumatic stress disorder in the military experience of veterans

Abstract

Purpose. The article provides an analytical review of the problem of self-compassion and psychological features of stress disorder in military personnel who have military life experience. Methods. To ensure the realization of the research goal, we involved the methods of scientific and theoretical study: analysis, synthesis, generalization, abstraction, thanks to which it was possible to find out the meaningful and functional purpose and combination of the analyzed phenomena. Results. The theoretical analysis of the thematic scientific and psychological literature on the problems of self-compassion and post-traumatic stress disorder gave reasons to assert the existence of close correlations between them. Self-compassion as one of the basic constructs of self-awareness of veteran combatants who are negatively affected by post-traumatic stress symptoms, together with other psychotechniques of self-support, usually plays a positive psychoprotective, rehabilitative and generally revitalizing and life-affirming function. Conclusions. Self-compassion expresses a person's desire to achieve psychological well-being and, together with self-esteem, self-acceptance, self-approval, self-affirmation, etc., attests to the formation of an important mechanism for holistic self-awareness of a person. Self-compassion allows you to reduce the feeling of guilt associated with the traumatic experience of the past, makes it possible to resist fatigue and burnout, provides the experience of subjective happiness, and serves as a guarantee of maintaining the mental health of military veterans. In general, self-compassion can have a relaxing effect on harmonizing the disturbed affectivity of a person with military experience and significantly optimize recovery after traumatic exposure and the consequences of post-traumatic stress disorder.