Posttraumatic relationship syndrome: The conscious processing of the world of trauma

This paper was aimed at describing a new trauma-based syndrome called Posttraumatic Relationship Syndrome (PTRS) which may afflict individuals who have been traumatized by physical, sexual, and/or severe emotional abuse within the context of an intimate relationship. It differs from Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in a number of ways, the most salient of which are the lack of a tendency toward numbing of responsiveness, which creates a very different mode of experiencing the “world of trauma”, and the inclusion of a category of relational symptoms. Whereas, in PTSD, there is overutilization of avoidant coping, PTRS involves the overuse of emotion-focused coping. The nature and psychosocial consequences of this syndrome are delineated.