It has been 10 years since Angie* helped her friend John after a violent assault in his home. John recovered and went back to work three months later, but Angie is left with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), battling to put her life back together.
But now she's upbeat about a chance to take part in intriguing research trials into possible new PTSD treatments being run by Professor Jim Lagopoulos, a neuroimaging expert and director of the Thompson Institute at the University of the Sunshine Coast.
Professor Lagopoulos is investigating options, including medication such as ketamine and magnetic stimulation of the brain.
Warning: This article contains an image and details of an assault some readers may find distressing
While there are no guarantees her application will be accepted, for Angie the trials could be a light in a tunnel she's been lost in since the October 2012 morning John failed to arrive at the office where they both worked.
"It was just was so unusual for John to not be there," Angie said.
"He's the most reliable guy you'll ever meet in your life and so we decided someone better go out and check on him."
When she arrived at her longtime friend's house, and before she could knock on the door, she saw a man she did not recognise walking down John's hallway.
The man was Daniel, a former housemate of John's who had some "reasonably significant mental health issues", Angie said.
Their lives were in danger
Daniel told Angie John was not home but her instinct was "to have a bit of a sticky-beak". Walking in she saw John on the floor behind Daniel "his arm flailing quite alarmingly".
John managed to tell Angie that Daniel had assaulted him with a hatchet now on a table nearby, covered in blood.
As Angie started to grasp the extent of John's injuries, she realised he needed urgent medical help and their lives were in danger.
"I'm not sure what kicked in ... something else stepped in and took control of the situation and I said to Daniel, 'Did you say you'd called an ambulance because I think we'd better get one'."
Through carefully worded responses, Angie was able to convey to the ambulance operator on the phone that she feared for her and John's safety — all while keeping Daniel "calm and not reactive".
When ambulance and police officers arrived 20 minutes later, Daniel was arrested.
He later pleaded guilty to deprivation of liberty, acts intended to cause grievous bodily harm and unlawful assault occasioning bodily harm while armed and was sentenced to seven years' jail.
World falls apart
Angie said after the ordeal she fell apart and just wanted to stop the consuming emotions and fear.
"From that moment on I just wanted to drink," she said.
"I went home from the police station and picked up a bottle of scotch and I kept a bottle of scotch with me for the next few months and became a vaguely functioning alcoholic, which I'm pretty annoyed about."
Angie persevered at work for the next four months but "couldn't function".
She quit her job and after time off she tried to work again but found she could not cope with stress the way she had before the attack on John.
She has been medicated for anxiety and depression ever since, worked with a psychologist and battles excruciating sleep deprivation.
"I sleep about two to three hours in a 24-hour period and that makes me pretty cranky and difficult to function."
Treatment hope for 'debilitating' condition
Angie's story is all too familiar to Professor Lagopoulos.
Symptoms often include anxiety, depression and hyper-vigilance "where even the slightest sound or the slightest smell or sight can trigger a cascade of anxiety-based responses".
He says treating PTSD is "complex and difficult" and while cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) helps some people, there is currently no "effective treatments".
But Professor Lagopoulos, an internationally recognised expert in neuroimaging, is researching new treatment approaches for PTSD.
He is conducting trials into new treatment options that could give symptomatic relief to those with PTSD, including the use of medications such as Ketamine and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).
"It's [TMS] very safe but it taps into magnetic pulses, which can alter the firing of neurons in the brain."
He says overseas trials are using psychedelic medicines, including MDMA to treat PTSD, and while they are in their early stages the data is "very encouraging".
"The psychedelic medication is used to get the patient in a particular state whereby then talking interventions such as CBT can then go in, you can process the trauma."
PTSD's impact on the brain
Professor Lagopoulos said effective treatment for PTSD was crucial because in those with long-term PTSD, there were "significant" changes that happen in the brain which "underpins the debilitating symptoms we see in post-traumatic stress disorder".
Those changes include a reduction in the grey matter in the pre-frontal cortex known as the decision-making hub of the brain and a loss of brain cells in the hippocampus where memories are managed and in the amygdala which controls emotions.
"All those three areas interact or talk to each other in a very sophisticated way.
"You only need one or more of those three areas to not be working the way it should be, to get a picture of how you can have very disordered and very abnormal behaviours that emanate because of that."
Professor Lagopoulos said 5 to 8 per cent of people in the general community who experienced a traumatic event would develop PTSD, but for first responders and those in the military, that rate doubled.
He says it is not known why some people develop long-term impacts while others, like John, are able to resume a normal life but genetics, prior traumas and childhood experiences are contributing factors.
Hopeful for the future
As Angie continues to heal, she empathises with other witnesses of traumatic events but does not want to detract from the impact that crime has on victims.
"There's no recognition of what they experience under the law, there's no major compensation.
"I struggle to continue to get the health care I need because I'm not working."
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Angie remains grateful that John has been able to move on with his life and hasn't given up hope on her own happiness.
"I'm hoping that one day I will be able to put this behind me and get a life back, get back to working and have a career and not be scared all the time."
*Surnames have been excluded to protect the identities of those involved.
