Yoga for Men with PTSD: Benefits and Experiences

Running head: Yoga 1
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Introduction
Yoga involves a combination of the body’s physical, mental, and spiritual practices that
help an individual to relax, improve health-wise and find happiness out of tension. It involves
deep in-breathing and breathing out. In addition, body exercises and self-meditation are
commonly used in yoga to promote discernment and regaining the peace of mind and
consciousness in a person. In the healthcare field, the general practitioners recommend the
practice of the yogic exercises to their patients to help them in regaining either their balance or
free them from any confusion and post-traumatic stress disorder. Medically yoga benefits the
patients in various ways such as enhancing her/his flexibility, promotes muscle strength and
tonal stability. Further, yogic exercises help to improve the respiratory system, synergy and
patient’s vitality (Cushing, Braun & Alden, 2018). Lastly, yoga aid in metabolic rate balancing
and offers protection against injury. The post-traumatic stress disorder refers to the mental
condition which develops on some of the people upon eye-witnessing a shocking and scary life-
time event such as a combat, an earthquake, natural disasters, grisly accident or traumatizing
sexual abuse. After an eyewitness has experienced a life-threatening event, he/she develops
disturbing memories that cause anxiety and depression.
In this paper, I shall focus on the experiences of men with PTSD taking yoga in order to
improve their well-being. Tasso, the 21-year-old is one of the men, mentioned in the given case
scenario. Tasso having witnessed a grisly road accident involving a motor vehicle is suffering
from post-traumatic stress disorder in which he is lacking sleep and having upsetting memories
on how the accident occurred. In the case of Tasso, yogic exercises will play a major role in
bringing back his normal sleeping pattern and help to restore a peace of mind (S. Haseena,
2011). Scientific research has proven that when yoga exercises are performed every day, enables
the patient, in this case, Tasso to sleep for longer periods, fall asleep quickly and go back to sleep
very quickly in instances of waking up amidst on the night. Yogic exercises result in the
flexibility of the joints and the straining of most of the muscles which bring about the sense of
stability and the well-being and also the body awareness. These actions aids with sleep, since the
moment one knows on how to let the hips free and shoulders’ relaxation, it is possible for one to
acquire a peace of mind through letting go of the unnecessary tensions in his/her body that are
detrimental to the pattern of one’s sleep (Ranganathan & Ramakrishnan, 2014). For Tasso, yoga

Yoga 3
will be very important in facilitating him to fall asleep and sleep for longer hours, her sister is
right. Tasso should adopt yoga and perform the daily exercises. The yoga postures will help
Tasso to let go stress in regard to the witnessed accident. The physical postures undertaken by
Tasso during the yogic exercises will bring about body movement and the muscles will be at a
good condition to have any stress hormones processed. Tasso should have yoga exercises gently
when the bedtime nears.
Men with the post-traumatic stress disorder have different experiences other those that
Tasso is experiencing after witnessing the motor vehicle accident. Most of the experiences have
long-term effects on the mental health and well-being of the affected men (Emerson & Hopper,
2011). Men who were involved in mass disasters such as an industrial disaster that might have
occurred in the past 30 years while they were young, they do still have the nightmares and
psychological injuries haunt them. For example, a young boy while at school at the age of 8
years still experiences the upsetting memories how the industrial disaster happened on his last
day in school before breaking for mid-term recess. The boy narrates how he lost his fellow pupils
in the tragic accident and the kind of physical injuries those who survived are still nursing
(Miller, 2013). The boy who is now a grown man gives a personal testimony that out of thirty-
four pupils only four of them survived the disaster, it was horrible! He stays that he was unable
to play since all his friends were no more, he sustained head, shoulder, stomach and leg injuries
which healed with time, he experienced frequent nightmares which were recurrent on what
happened that day ("Hot yoga relieves depression", 2017). The man testifies that still, the
psychological injuries are fresh in his mind. While at his young age, he developed an element of
fear, he even feared for the repeat of the disaster, this made him even not to go back to school.
Furthermore, his concentration ability dropped rapidly. The man is still experiencing nightmares
for years now, flashback memories on what happened on that material day, the face of a girl on
his shoulder, tremendous and loud noise as a result of thunder that struck the industry, the
crowding fear, and the feeling of being guilty on why he was the only who survived while others
perished (Gartlehner, 2013). All those experiences torment his life being leading into anxiety,
desperation, and depression. Yoga will help in the well-being of this man through meditation
sessions, bedtime yogic exercises to send him into an early sleep which will last for long hours
(Chokroverty, 2014). In addition, through yoga he will no longer be immobilized, his joints will
move during the exercises and the muscles will be also moved to make the relevant organs to