So that's probably an odd title. It's probably also a mildly odd topic. And a weirder still first topic to use on my first Proper Official Forum use ever. But here's the deal: I have tourettes. It manifests itself as a vocal-and-physical tic. The physical tic I can deal with because it, generally at least though it's started changing a little recently, mostly involves a twitch of the head (and, more recently, an arm or a leg or both hands attempting to flee from my very body). The vocal tic, though? That's...a little more embarrassing. It ranges from a quiet little squeak that often gets mistaken for a sneeze or just a cute noise to...what I can best describe as something a little more like this: My lovely ol' tourettes likes to make sure that when I'm out somewhere fancy in public, and my anxiety disorder's acting up, I sound less like a cute squeaky mouse and more like a screaming idiot. Last time this happened was in a sushi restaurant with friends and ended with the entire body of the restaurant looking at me like some sort of madman. And of course my friend's got a birthday tomorrow so we're heading out to the city and...probably back to the restaurant where this happened. So! Basically my question boils down to this: does anyone else here have tourettes and if so do you have any idea at all how to make it chill out a little? Because I'm not ready to play Goat Screaming In Public volume two on hard mode again just yet. So any advice at all would be awesome.
-waves- Fellow Tourettes person here! I've gotten really lucky with my tics and had people to help me with them from a young age so my experience might be pretty different! Tics can be somewhat held back but it'll explode later. I was taught to be aware of my tics so I could keep them down in class and allowed to tic freely when I got home. You might be able to hold the verbal tics in in a restaurant and then Screaming Goat afterwards (might require understanding friends) The old "when you want to do the thing, do something else" sometimes works with tics as well. If you know you're about to Screaming Goat, you might be able to squeak instead. There's more therapy and medication options for tics now than there used to be if those are options for you. Also the Stimming thread in the sperg forum is a pretty interesting read. A lot of "I know the feel" moments for me.
Ahh, thank you for the advice! I've only been diagnosed this year, probably because the tics used to be a lot more relaxed and appear to be doing that getting-stronger-with-age thing. I've been briefly told about the holding the tics back thing but I have no idea where to start with that. I know the feelings I get before my tics happen, I'm assuming that's a good place to start, but I honestly don't know how to squash them. The only time I don't tic at all is when I'm on stage and doing acting type things. xP
-sneaks in very quietly and whispers- Gotta admit the little ones make you sound like a tiny adorable kitten, though.
