Is Procrastination A Trauma Response? Uncovering The Hidden Link

This site contains product affiliate links and ProactivityLab.com may earn from qualifying purchases.

It is common knowledge that procrastination has many comorbidities with other mental disorders, such as depression, OCD, and ADHD. This time, let’s tackle the relationship between procrastination and trauma, or PTSD.

Trauma, or what’s clinically known as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), is a complex mental disorder that is the result of a traumatic experience that causes long term harmful effects on your thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. You may use different coping mechanisms to deal with the effects of the trauma.

Yes, procrastination can be triggered or worsened by past trauma and can be used as a coping response for people who have gone through a traumatic event or are suffering from PTSD.

People react to and deal with trauma in different ways, but procrastination has been identified as a way for people with PTSD to avoid negative and uncomfortable emotions.

Let’s go through the literature and some science to uncover how PTSD and past trauma can lead to procrastination behavior and how you should deal with that.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) In a Nutshell

According to the Mayo Clinic, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health condition that’s triggered by experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event.

Symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares, and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the event.

If you’ve suffered a traumatic experience, you may find it difficult to adjust and cope with your symptoms. This can interfere with your ability to live your normal life and may cause significant problems in your relationships and in your academic or professional life.

PTSD symptoms and coping mechanisms differ from person to person, but they usually manifest in four ways:

Intrusive and uncontrollable memories and flashbacks about the traumatic event,

Avoidance of certain places, activities, or people that remind you of the event

Mood disturbances such as negative thoughts, anxiety, and depression, lack of interest in activities, memory problems, and hopelessness

Hyperarousal is a change in the way you react physically and emotionally, such as being angry and irritable, having difficulty concentrating, having sleeping problems, and being easily startled.

How Trauma Can Lead to Procrastination ?

When you’ve been through a traumatic event, you might show symptoms like anxiety and depression, or you might start using unhealthy tricks to deal with these symptoms, like avoidance and hypervigilance, all of which can lead to procrastination.

Let’s look at how trauma can lead to procrastination.

Avoidance: One of the main symptoms of PTSD is avoidance; you avoid places and situations, memories, and thoughts that remind you of your traumatic experience.

So, you may start avoiding crowded places or interacting with your coworkers. You can also avoid noisy places that remind you of an assault or avoid cleaning or putting your house in order because you may stumble upon things that remind you of your deceased mother.

This avoidance strategy will inevitably make you put off necessary tasks and activities that can trigger distressing emotions and thoughts. This can make you avoid more and more tasks, which leads to more procrastination.

Mood disturbances: Trauma can lead to a myriad of depressive and anxiety symptoms, such as difficulty concentrating, losing interest in daily activities, feeling depressed and hopeless, fear and stress, loss of motivation, fatigue, etc. All these symptoms are known to lead to procrastination.

If you feel tired all the time and have no motivation to do anything, it is no surprise that you will start neglecting important activities and tasks and delaying family obligations or work assignments.

Emotional dysregulation: Trauma can have a long-term impact on your ability to regulate your emotions, which means that you become less able to manage your emotions and react appropriately to different external and internal stimuli.

Check out our article : Procrastination and Emotional Regulation: An In-depth Exploration of Their Connection.

Research has also demonstrated significant association between PTSD and impulsive behaviors like binge eating and substance abuse. This impulsivity is also believed to be the result of emotion dysregulation.

This poor self-regulation that stems from your past trauma can also be blamed for your chronic procrastination.

Let’s give an example to explain this effect.

When you are faced with an uncomfortable but important task (such as starting a work project), someone with a good capacity to regulate their emotions will try to tolerate the negative feelings associated with the task and can show sufficient self-control to accomplish the job.

However, when you have poor emotion regulation, the aversiveness of the task is so overwhelming that you can’t get yourself to manage your negative emotions and get yourself to do the job.

Changes in core beliefs: Studies have shown that traumatic events can have a devastating impact on your belief system and how you view yourself, others, and the world in general.

For instance, you may say to yourself, “I am a failure,” “the world is dangerous,” “I fail at everything I do,” or “Nothing is worth it anymore.”

All of these assumptions and beliefs can also lead to procrastination. For instance, if your core belief is “I fail at everything I do,” you may start avoiding activities out of fear of failure. You will not be willing to work on your school project or work assignments because you already assume you’ll fail.

Is Procrastination a Symptom Of PTSD?

From a clinical standpoint, procrastination is not considered a symptom of PTSD. However, symptoms of PTSD and some dysfunctional coping mechanisms can lead to or worsen procrastination.

If you suffer a trauma, you may start avoiding crowded places; this avoidance is a negative coping mechanism that will make you more likely to postpone or avoid altogether tasks and activities that require you to be in public.

It is worth mentioning, however, that procrastination is not specific to PTSD, which means that not all persons who experience a traumatic event or suffer from PTSD will become chronic procrastinators.

Procrastination As a Coping Mechanism

Procrastination can be a dysfunctional coping mechanism that PTSD sufferers use to manage their emotions and deal with their symptoms.

For example, avoiding an activity that you consider unpleasant, like attending a job meeting, can be a coping mechanism that you use to avoid triggering unpleasant thoughts, emotions, or memories of the traumatic event.

This coping mechanism can take on a life of its own and prevent you from living a normal and fulfilling life.

Other negative coping responses often associated with trauma and PTSD are:

Addictions and substance abuse
Compulsive behavior like gambling
Avoiding people
hypervigilance
Anger and violence
Reckless behavior

Complex PTSD And Procrastination

Typical PTSD occurs when you experience one traumatic event, such as rape, physical assault, or a car accident. Complex PTSD, on the other hand, is caused by long-term and repeated traumas, such as domestic violence or child abuse.

It is believed that complex PTSD often leads to more prolonged and severe personality changes and a more profound alteration in your belief system.

Because of the prolonged length of the trauma, your negative views of yourself and others may be more radical and resistant to treatment, which can contribute to more severe and chronic forms of procrastination.

How To Deal With PTSD ?

Procrastination can be considered one of the many harmful effects that trauma or PTSD can have in your life. With that in mind, you should first tackle the symptoms of PTSD, because when your PTSD symptoms get better, it is very likely that your procrastination will also improve.

Many treatments are available for people with PTSD. Psychotherapy, and especially cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), are considered the gold standard in the treatment of PTSD. Medication is also another treatment option.

If you think you have symptoms of PTSD that are interfering with your day-to-day life, it is important to seek professional help.

If you are hesitant to ask for help in person, there is specialized online therapy available with licensed therapists.

According to the American Psychological Association, teletherapy is just as effective as in-person sessions for treating a wide range of mental health conditions, including depression and anxiety disorders.

One of the leading online therapy platforms you can try is Talk Space, which includes a wide network of licensed providers covering a broad range of mental health specialties, including PTSD and other mental health issues.