When can't this be treated successfully?

[DianaR]

I work with special needs students, many of whom have started their lives with extremely stressful situations that will continue, without a doubt, until they are old enough to leave home.

I find that many people who begin in circumstance that lead to PTSD that last through their first 18 years of life, develop coping behaviors or protective behaviors that are as natural as eating for other people.  Is their form of PTSD almost untreatable once they reach adulthood?

[Turion]

my personal belief is that all psychological problems are treatable, how an individual repsonds to treatment will vary with each person. can you give examples of some of the behaviours?

[Shell]

I too believe that how an individual responds to treatment varies with each person.

My PTSD was diagnosed when I was 25 and it manifested from both childhood and adulthood experiences.  After about 3 years of therapy (with medication only in the last year) and becoming a Christian, I can say for certain that my disorder is sucessfully treated.  Maybe I still encounter some slipups, but I can now handle situations much better than I used to.  My mental state is a lot more stable and capable of coping with certain triggers.

There are some cases that may severely impact a child and may be close to impossible to treat, however.  Consider a child victim of narcissism, for instance.

I researched narcissism so much I can almost smell it.  I read an article that discussed a narcissistic father who wanted to win a custody battle.  He totally brainwashed his child so that the child believed the mother was the enemy.  The narcissist had done so much damage to this child's mentality that the child himself began to portray narcissistic tendencies. If not recognized and treated early, the child's narcissistic traits may grow to overpower all other traits in this child's personality and the child will become a narcissist himself.

I do know that even if a narcissistic father is physically abusive toward his child victim, he can twist the child's mind so much that the child will still suffer PTSD, but will still develop narcissistic traits and become a narcissist himself.  Of course, if the child is able to be treated early then the abuse may be reversible.  However, depending on how long the abuse and how young the child, it is possible that the child's treatment will never be successful.  An adult narcissist is extremely hard and exhausting to treat.

[SWM]

this is a good point Cecile. i am sure this is the same with many disorders. i am trying to recall and it may come back to me, from where i aquired this knowledge, but i have in my mind from somewhere, the following.

certain types of disorder are the result of previous trauma, the severity and duration of the trauma will correllate to the severity and duration of the disorder. how severe, how long the episode of trauma lasted, and the rate of repetition, of traumatic experiences will be an indicator of the resulting disorder.

now that i have thought about it, i am certain this information came from literature related to childhood sexual abuse. there are similarities with what you describe in the narcissistic type of conditioning above and i would bet my life (so to speak) that the same mechanism will operate in the development of all forms of disorder that arise from psychosocial problems.

[jjamo]

Can someone tell me , if possible ,
 how does one seperate the symptoms that relate the ptsd and the add ?