Metaphors, Trauma and Symptoms

1 Trauma, language, and metaphor

1.1 Preliminaries

Individuals who have experienced or witnessed a traumatic event may undergo a mixture of overwhelming emotions such as anxiety, anger, depression, and confusion. They may also encounter various cognitive and physical disturbances, including intrusive thoughts, flashbacks, and nightmares about the traumatic event, difficulty in sleeping and concentrating, and physical reactions like headaches and nausea. These symptoms usually disappear within days or weeks after the traumatic event (Cardeña & Carlson 2011). However, it is also possible that these disturbances persist for months and years, leading to trauma-related mental disorders such as adjustment disorder, Acute Stress Disorder (ASD), ...