Read entire article by Michelle Simon from Sacramento Bee.
Klyda Flanders held a stuffed toy monkey to her chest with one hand as she lay on a cot in an evacuation shelter in Gridley, near the town of Paradise. Her other hand was held by a Red Cross volunteer, Michelle Maki, who knelt by Flanders’ bed.
Maki nodded as Flanders talked about fleeing her home in Paradise and the uncertainty of not knowing what lies ahead now that her old life is in ash.
“You cannot imagine what it’s like, and I’m one of the lucky ones,” said Flanders.
Flanders, 68, is one of the thousands of Paradise residents who were forced to evacuate due to the Camp Fire, the deadliest wildfire in California’s history. The fire killed 86 people and destroyed 13,972 homes, according to Cal Fire. For the survivors, recovering means more than replacing physical items. Many face a long path toward restoring peace of mind, and for some, overcoming mental trauma and illness that can take years to heal.
“Mental health symptoms were more prevalent in people who evacuated and were more likely to be in a life-threatening situation,” said Irva Hertz-Picciotto, director of environmental health sciences at UC Davis who has studied the mental health effects of wildfires. “That can have long term effects of post-traumatic stress symptoms.”
A recent study by Hertz-Picciotto found 60 percent of wildfire survivors surveyed experienced increases in anxiety and stress.
Post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, is often associated with army veterans and survivors of domestic violence. But PTSD can happen to anyone who experiences an extreme amount of stress that overwhelms coping skills, according to Caroline Giroux, a Sacramento-based psychiatrist who specializes in trauma.
And it can manifest itself in a variety of ways.
Giroux says the first symptoms many people exhibit are shock and dissociation. Some may also experience irritability, depression or anxiety.
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