Analyzing PTSD Across The Walking Dead

 

The Walking Dead was once one of television’s most popular shows, with viewership soaring as high as 17 million viewers during episode premieres in 2014. Since then, the series popularity has waned, but its themes still remain. One of the most prevalent is the theme of PTSD and how to rebuild a society when most people are suffering from this, and many other, mental health conditions. The world of the Walking Dead is not an easy one and many characters find themselves in impossible situations that push their psyche to the breaking point. These characters all show similar symptoms with each other, but also display differences in how said symptoms are presented.

We’ll start with Carl Grimes, son of main character Rick Grimes, in the season 4 premiere. In the previous season finale, there is a battle between the prison group and the Governor. During the battle, Carl gets the drop on a kid not much older than himself. Despite the kid surrendering, Carl guns the kid down in fear of retribution. His father, seeing the brutal path they are both going down, decides that they both need a change. The premiere opens up with Carl now assisting his father with farming for the community. Despite the relative peace they have had, it doesn’t last long. At one point, fellow survivor Michonne hurts herself trying to return to the prison and is swarmed by zombies (in the show called “walkers”). Carl uses a nearby gun to kill them, but the look on his face as he is forced to pick up a gun again after several months of peace is palpable. This then leads into a multiple episode arc of Carl both wanting to be armed, but also not wanting to be in the thick of things. He knows what he has to do, but the fear of losing himself again holds him back.

This is similar to certain symptoms of PTSD. With the apocalypse being ongoing, avoiding the triggering event is next to impossible. Avoiding is a common symptom with PTSD, whether it’s avoiding the situation or the triggers behind it. Rick helped Carl use avoidance as a coping skill. While avoidance isn’t always a bad thing, especially in cases where the triggering situation can be avoided, it doesn’t always work. Shooting and killing a walker was enough to reignite that trauma and cause a fear response immediately after. While he did end up saving Michonne, it reignited the memory of killing his fellow man.

An even more prevalent example is the character of Sasha Williams in season 5 of the show, both after she loses her boyfriend Bob Stookey and her brother, Tyreese, within a handful of episodes. Their deaths ended up triggering a multitude of PTSD symptoms, such as flashbacks, avoidance, mood changes, reactivity, recklessness, and depersonalization. In Sasha’s case, the flashbacks mainly consisted of her brother and boyfriend when she would shoot her gun during practice, namely stock family photos. She utilized avoidance by leaving the community multiple times to hunt walkers on her own. The mood changes were displayed during interactions with newer characters, such as wanting to die when talking to priest Gabriel Stokes or apprehension around Alexandria leader Deanna Monroe when asked to attend a housewarming party. These mood changes also turned into reactivity several times, such as yelling at a party goer at said housewarming party over being asked what she wanted to eat. Recklessness was displayed while taking out walkers on the road. Rather than following the plan, Sasha decided to take them out one on one. This caused the group to rush and help her, which almost got Rick bit, Abraham cut, and Michonne nearly stabbed. Lastly, she displayed signs of depersonalization by throwing walker bodies into a pit and then lying with them, pretending to be dead and not responding to the world.

A more subtle but no less profound showing of PTSD is in the character of Abraham Ford, first introduced in season 4. When we first meet him, he is a man on a mission to get fellow survivor Eugene Porter to Washington D.C. We quickly learn that he is uncompromising and always needs to be on the move, becoming abrasive if any setbacks occur. This is later explained in season 5, with his wife and daughter having been sexually assaulted. In a fit of rage, he killed their assailants, but this scared his family away and they were later devoured by the dead before he could find them. Eugene arrives as Abraham is going to kill himself and asks for his help, giving his life a new purpose.

Abraham is using avoidance to cope with the death of his family. He keeps Eugene safe because it helps him not have to confront the enormity of what he has lost. When setbacks occur, his psyche begins to unravel and cause more issues. He willingly almost sacrifices the whole group when confronted with a horde of the dead and decides they can’t keep making detours. When challenged, he becomes belligerent, confrontational, and has several outbursts of anger. In one such fit of rage, he nearly kills Eugene and threatens Rosita Espinosa, his girlfriend at the time. Upon learning that Eugene isn’t who he said he is, Abraham has a full breakdown where he goes catatonic for a whole day in the middle of the road and won’t eat or drink. This highlights another symptom of PTSD: disassociation.

One last example to look at comes from the main character himself: Rick Grimes. Throughout the show, Rick was the anchor of the group that held them in check when it came to morality. As the show progressed, he began to lose that objectivity and would occasionally slip into the world of depravity. A good example of Rick’s PTSD again comes in season 5 when the group arrives at Alexandria. From the beginning, before the group even reaches the safe haven, Rick is suspicious. He brutally beats and questions Alexandria’s scout, Aaron, for information and initially refuses to entertain the idea of joining the community. It is not until he hears children playing behind the walls that he lets go of his trauma enough to allow his newfound family to enter.

However, his symptoms continue through the rest of the season. He becomes suspicious of the Alexandrians, finding them weak. He insists that if the Alexandrians can’t keep up with the way the world works, they can always kill them. He meets a fellow survivor, Jessie Anderson, and quickly becomes infatuated with her, transferring his grief over his deceased wife onto this new love interest. Most of his PTSD manifests in the behavioral category, such as flirting with Jessie despite her being married, threatening her husband (and later a significant portion of the town) with a gun, plotting to take over the town, and being paranoid about how their relationship with the Alexandrians will play out. It is only after his friend, Michonne, intervenes that he begins to see the error of his ways, but these plotlines are not fully resolved until further into season 6. Rick’s distrust is understandable given the group’s run-ins with various factions (Woodbury,
Terminus, Grady Memorial) but the assumption and paranoia around this new group takes it to new and devastating heights. The Alexandrians feel alienated by his actions and for a few episodes, there is a debate about simply kicking Rick out of Alexandria. They find him a danger to himself and to others and in some ways, people can interpret severe PTSD similarly.

Unlike the survivors on the Walking Dead, mental health services are available. At Behavioral Health Clinic (BHC), we have clinicians who specialize in working with PTSD and other mental health conditions. While most PTSD is not as extreme as presented in the show, their symptoms can manifest in different ways. If you or a loved one is experiencing some of these symptoms, please reach out to BHC at 855.607.8242 or email us at appointments@bhclinic.com.