Study finds PTSD effects may linger in body chemistry of next generation

59 year old Karen Sonneberg

grew up on the north shore
of Long Island,

just an hour's drive
from New York City.

Her parents survived
the Holocaust,

but rarely mentioned it.

All I knew was that
we were different,

that I was different.

I didn't exactly know why.

Her parents were Jewish,
born in Germany.

After Hitler came to power,
their families fled.

Sonneberg's parents
were just children,

but carried the traumas
of Nazi oppression

throughout their lives.

My mother,
from the time she was 3, on.

My father,
from the time he was 5 or 6 years old.

He was...

subjected to...

the painful existence
in Germany.

Despite her own
comfortable upbringing

here in the U. S.,

Sonneberg privately
struggled for years

with anxiety and stress.

While she couldn't prove it,

she believed it was
somehow linked

to her parents'
traumatic childhoods.

Having discussed this
with many of my friends,

who come from
similar backgrounds,

it seems to be
consistent in most of us.

There were definitely
challenges, that

"American kids"
didn't seem to have experienced.

Even though you weren't there.

Exactly.

That's the amazing
part of it.

Now, a new study

published this month

in the scientific journal
"Biological Psychiatry"

bolsters Sonneberg's belief
that she experienced

the after-effects
of her parents' trauma.

Dr. Rachel Yehuda,

director of Mt. Sinai's

Traumatic Stress
Studies division,

led the study.

Her team interviewed,
and drew blood,

from 32 sets of survivors
and their children,

focusing on a gene
called FKBP5.

We already know
that this is a gene

that contributes to risk
for depression

and Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder.

Yehuda noticed a pattern

among the Holocaust survivors

called an "epigenetic change."

Not a change in the gene itself,

but rather, a change

in a chemical marker
attached to it.

When we looked at
their own children,

their children also
had an epigenetic change,

in the same spot,
on the stress-related gene.

What does that suggest?

Well, in the first generation,

in a Holocaust survivor,

it suggests that there has been

an adaptation or a response
to a horrendous environmental event.

in the second generation,

it suggests that there
has also been

a response, of the offspring,
to this parental trauma.

Which means, children
of Holocaust survivors,

like Sonneberg,

could be more likely to
develop stress or anxiety disorders.

Though their study was small,

Yehuda and her team
controlled for any early trauma

the survivors' children
may have experienced, themselves.

How is it that a parent,

who was subjected to
the trauma of the Holocaust,

is able to somehow
transmit that to a child

who wasn't there?

Well that's a really good question.

The study that we did
doesn't address the "hows."

The study that we did

just provides the proof of concept.

We might be able to identify the "how,"
if we do more research.

DNA is passed from parents to children.

Research like Yehuda's suggests
parental life experiences

can modify their
body chemistry,

and those modifications

can be transmitted
to children, as well.

Scientists have examined
this idea before.

After a famine in Holland
during 1944 and 1945,

children were born
with the effects of malnutrition,

two generations
after the food shortage ended.

Previously, Yehuda herself

studied stress hormone levels

in children born to women

who survived the September 11th
terrorist attacks.

She's been examining the link
between trauma experienced

by Holocaust survivors
and their children,

for more than twenty years.

A trauma is an event
that changes you.

It doesn't have to change you
for the negative.

Trauma changes you
in lots of different ways.

Most people who experience
extreme trauma

learn a great deal
from that experience.

Some of those lessons
may be lessons

that are transmitted
to the child.

That's not a bad thing.

Yehuda says

the implications aren't limited
to Holocaust survivors,

but this dwindling population
provides insight

into how clinicians
understand and treat

stress disorders.

If you are at risk
for heart disease,

a lot of times the doctor
can separate out,

"Well this is your weight,
that's not good."

"This is your diet,
these are your genetic risks."

And things like that.

It would be very nice,
if we could develop

a similar risk profile
in the mental health arena,

where we would be able
to understand

where the risk factors come from
for depression and anxiety.

We're on the 10th anniversary
of Hurricane Katrina.

There were children who were born
after that trauma.

There are children born
in the trauma of war in Syria

and other crises around the world.

If you are the child
of a parent who experienced trauma,

are you doomed

to be depressed or stressed
for the rest of your life?

I don't think you are doomed.

But, I think many children
of traumatized parents

have struggled with
depression and anxiety.

I can tell you that
many of them have felt relieved

that, um...

there might be
a contributing factor

that has been based on

how they are responding
to their parental trauma.

I think that it has helped people
work through

a lot of that
depression and anxiety.

Relief is exactly
what Karen Sonneberg,

the child of Holocaust survivors,

felt, after she participated

in one of Dr. Yehuda's
trauma survivor studies.

She lost her mother
thirty years ago,

but looks forward to
her father's 90th birthday

next year.

I've learned to cope
in my life.

I've learned to move on,

and get over all of this.

Had I known, at the time,

how my reactions
could impact future children,

my children's reactions,

I might have dealt with things
differently.

Um, or, gotten them
some sort of treatment,

that maybe would help them
in the future.