Tuesday’s earthquake: shaky, sure, but traumatic??

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Whenever anything in this world happens, it’s only a matter of time before we receive an earnest news release offering advice as to how folks can cope with the emotional trauma of the event (and, of course, instructions on how to talk to kids about it). The words ‘post-traumatic stress’ come up a lot. Thus the following missive, received this morning, came as no surprise:

‘With yesterday’s L.A. earthquake, thought you and your audience would be interested in learning more about how to deal with the psychological effects after living through an earthquake. Sometimes even the sound of the air-conditioner turning on can cause panic for days or weeks after the fact. PeopleJam, an online self-improvement site, has compiled a list of the ways you and your family can lessen the ‘after-shock’ of an earthquake.’

Um, Earth to PeopleJam -- Tuesday’s was a 5.4 temblor -- in L.A., land of earthquakes. There were a dozen minor injuries, some minor damage such as smashed windows. The biggest strains to our infrastructure, according to an L.A. Times article, were ‘felt in phone and Internet systems, which buckled because of overwhelming demand in the minutes after the jolt.’ Oh, and our local transportation slowed down -- traumatic, I will grant, to anyone already dealing with the Gold Line crawl through South Pasadena.

The pronouncement of a colleague’s 11-year-old daughter? ‘Awesome.’ I don’t think that mother has any plans to ask said daughter to express her feelings further (‘Totally cool’).

We’re not saying minor earthquakes aren’t sometimes scary, nor that anyone who’s dealt with larger ones, especially if they’ve suffered personal and material losses from them, isn’t going to feel emotional fallout. But please, can we save the trauma talk for more cataclysmic events?

By the way, even if this were a real disaster, it still isn’t necessarily helpful to talk about it as PeopleJam recommends among its list of tips (‘Talk with someone about your feelings -- anger, fear, sorrow and other emotions -- even though it may be difficult.’) In fact, such emoting can sometimes make things worse. Read about that in an article in this week’s Health section by staff writer Susan Brink.

-- Rosie Mestel