Reliving the event: through thoughts and memories of the trauma. This can include flashbacks, hallucinations, and nightmares. Reminders of a traumatic event like anniversaries can be especially difficult. Avoiding: The person may avoid people, thoughts, places, and situations. This can make them feel isolated and detached from friends and family and lead to a loss of interest in things the person once enjoyed. Increased arousal: excessive emotions, difficulty staying or falling asleep, outbursts of anger, irritability, being easily startled, and trouble relating to people. The person may also have high blood pressure and heart rate, rapid breathing, muscle tension, nausea, and diarrhea. Negative mood and thoughts: this can include blame, depression, and memories of the event.