Help with Tourettes please!

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 have a book on my shelves by James McConnel "Life, interrupted - the true story of a life driven by tourrette's" published 2006 by Headline Review (paperback 2007) .  It is an autobiographical work and though one sole perspective, it might be useful. I don't think it is linked to ASD but certainly illustrates the problems.

Reply
  • I have a book on my shelves by James McConnel "Life, interrupted - the true story of a life driven by tourrette's" published 2006 by Headline Review (paperback 2007) .  It is an autobiographical work and though one sole perspective, it might be useful. I don't think it is linked to ASD but certainly illustrates the problems.

Children
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