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Help with Tourettes please!

boyofsteele

I am not sure if anyone can help with this....I have posted before about issues concerning our son's autistic tendencies, but he was also diagnosed with Tourettes and this now seems to be coming into play more seriously than the autistic tendencies, although I know there are very many overlaps and some consider Tourettes to be part of the spectrum.

What started out as small 'ticks' like throat clearing and repetitive little coughs, eye blinking and mouth-wiping for example, are now changing to more aggressive/more noticable ticks, like whistling in the middle of sentences, very wide mouth opening (causing split corners of his lips) and severe head shakes which hurt his shoulders and neck and cause discomfort and are exhausting for him. 

Coupled with this is huge amounts of aggression, which, again has overlaps with autism, and blurting of very rude outbursts when he is angry.

We were warned that the path might be that the small ticks might increase to where they are now, with a possibilty that they might escalate into inadvertant lashing out at people. He already lashes out at us in anger, but it is our very real worry that the Tourettes side of things will lead to the next stage and begin to involve others. His teacher at school has been distressed by the violence of his latest ticks, but at school, his behaviour issues are kept at bay, with this exception.

Does anyone else have a child that suffers in this way, as our son truly does suffer as he struggles to make sense of why he behaves like this and we are suffering from the worry that we do not know how to help him adequately.

Obviously I can do my own research, but I would be really appreciative if there is someone who could reply if they are having a similar experience! Many thanks!

Parents

  • I venture to ask if his unpleasant or aggressive actions come out of the blue or arise when you are trying to discuss things with him.

    Part of sensory overload seems to be a bottleneck effect. If your mind is full of unresolved issues going round and round in your head, and someone suddenly confronts you and wants explanations NOW, then the reaction is because the capacity to cope has been overwhelmed.

    You don't have to be ASD to experience this, as everyone experiences stress overload sometimes, but it happens much more often with ASD and it may not be so obvious as with an NT because the boiling point is near all the time, and he may be less effective at showing it.

    Try asking if it is a good time to talk, and also saying what it is about first. Try not to sit facing but to one side, so the pressure of confriontation is eased. Don't both parents go at it.

    Try asking if there are any issues troubling him that he feels you can help with, rather than you deciding the topic.

    Certainly do not assume that everything is alright in school. Things have improved a bit for neuro-diverse diabilities, but not hugely. Someone odd will get bullied. There may be many things causing anxiety, including his mis-perception of things and being dis-proportionately concerned about them. He wont be able to discuss this with peers. So it'll just go round and round in his head (spiralling anxiety and negative re-inforcement is par for the course). The adverse reaction may be for what seems trivial reasons but it is often just the last straw on top of many burdens.

    You have to build a perspective around ASD/tourrettes that understands that anxiety is high, and a state of tension is prolonged, even by normal teenage standards.

     

Reply

  • I venture to ask if his unpleasant or aggressive actions come out of the blue or arise when you are trying to discuss things with him.

    Part of sensory overload seems to be a bottleneck effect. If your mind is full of unresolved issues going round and round in your head, and someone suddenly confronts you and wants explanations NOW, then the reaction is because the capacity to cope has been overwhelmed.

    You don't have to be ASD to experience this, as everyone experiences stress overload sometimes, but it happens much more often with ASD and it may not be so obvious as with an NT because the boiling point is near all the time, and he may be less effective at showing it.

    Try asking if it is a good time to talk, and also saying what it is about first. Try not to sit facing but to one side, so the pressure of confriontation is eased. Don't both parents go at it.

    Try asking if there are any issues troubling him that he feels you can help with, rather than you deciding the topic.

    Certainly do not assume that everything is alright in school. Things have improved a bit for neuro-diverse diabilities, but not hugely. Someone odd will get bullied. There may be many things causing anxiety, including his mis-perception of things and being dis-proportionately concerned about them. He wont be able to discuss this with peers. So it'll just go round and round in his head (spiralling anxiety and negative re-inforcement is par for the course). The adverse reaction may be for what seems trivial reasons but it is often just the last straw on top of many burdens.

    You have to build a perspective around ASD/tourrettes that understands that anxiety is high, and a state of tension is prolonged, even by normal teenage standards.

     

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