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Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a severe stress disorder that develops after psychological trauma, like experiencing a war or sexual abuse, overwhelming a patient’s coping ability. PTSD cause an overactive adrenaline response persisting after the event, making a patient hypersensitive to future fearful situations.

People prone to PTSD are statistically likely to have anxiety disorders, a tendency toward alcoholism, nicotine, drug dependency and a history of child abuse.

Extreme or chronic stress can eventually damage the brain and the body. If a mother is highly or chronically stressed while pregnant, her child is more likely to have emotional or cognitive problems like attention deficits, hyperactivity, anxiety, and language delay. The fetal environment can be altered when maternal stress changes the mother’s hormone profile.

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