Antidepressants that modulate the noradrenergic or serotonergic systems can be counterproductive for trauma recovery by preventing the REM sleep necessary to process emotions.

“antidepressants are often noradrenergic or serotonergic reuptake inhibitors. So they leave norepinephrine actually out there in the synapses. And what that does is it inhibits REM sleep. And if you're able to get REM sleep, it would probably be REM sleep with some noradrenergic activity. So actually”

Treating trauma successfully requires fully experiencing and processing emotions rather than suppressing or fighting them.

“The full expression of an emotion is the funeral p of that emotion.”