Bad Tic Day
I spend and waste a lot of time on weighing the difference between pathology and personality when it comes to my actions and behaviors. For instance, I've always been a bad long-term planner. It's possible that I would have always been this way, Tourette Syndrome or not. It's also possible that the variable, but usually consistent, extent to which my TS has a grip on my minute-by-hour-by-day life keeps me hopelessly rooted in my immediate present. I think my constant concern about and awareness of what my body is doing at any given moment, along with the way my brain gets wrapped up in useless thought loops, sometimes leaves me hyper-aware of the exact moment I'm in. Bad tic days are the worst for this, and today was a good example.
I've seen the phrase "bad tic day" bandied about on the Tweeter and in the Facebook groups I'm a member of. For the non-TS patient reading this, it's important to know that not every day with Tourette's is the same, the same way that not every person's Tourette's is the same. What is a bad tic day for me might be the best tic day of another person's life, and she may dance a jig and hit up ten clubs in one night while the same day leaves me sore and cranky. As in all things, "bad" is relative.
Oddly, I remember thinking for the last few days that I wasn't ticcing too badly. I woke up the same way. I haven't been sleeping well lately, which usually bodes a rough day for my tics. My mouth and jaw and eyebrows got going when I arrived at work, which is par for the course. To a passerby I probably would have looked mostly normal this morning, as long as you didn't have to hear my internal monologue. I've started calling my Tourette's voice Wesley Crusher, because he's so effing annoying. Ensign Crusher decided that while I was working, I should also be repeatedly, in my head, be spelling the last name of that poor journalist who was murdered in Saudi Arabia. Over and over and over, while counting the number of letters in his last name on the non-thumb fingers of my right hand each time. This is a good time to mention that I do manual labor at work. I really need Wesley to let me use my right hand whenever I need it. So for most of the morning, this was going on. I had the weird thought that, like I said, anyone else who saw me probably wouldn't know I had Tourette's. Does this constitute a good tic day? Like, am I getting away with it? This isn't really a condition-facing thought, but I couldn't help myself. It had been a bad internal tic day for ME. Unfortunately, I think a good percentage of the mental energy I burn up as a result of having Tourette's goes towards hiding it and worrying about how other people perceive me. Anyway, a lot of the morning was spent in a lengthy struggle to just get out of my head and be productive.
I've been learning a new position in work, which is awesome. I've been doing the same work for about five years now, and I needed a change. I'll still be doing a lot of my old work, but I'll be taking on this new work as well. A positive development, to be sure! The one drawback, which I'm sure some other TS patients can relate to, is that my Tourette's takes any new physical action as an open door for new/changed tics. I've always had a shoulder shrug, but the way I'm standing in a kind of confined space doing this new work has quickly made it my primary, and most painful, tic. As I'm typing, the area between my shoulder blades is aching like nobody's business. For the better part of my afternoon, my normally up-and-down shrug became my shoulder blades trying to meet over my spine. I'd do it five or six times in quick succession every minute or two. I couldn't wait to be out of there just so I could abandon the peculiar posture I assume while I'm doing that work. I felt every minute of my day, and all because of the Tourette's. It sucked. Every day isn't this bad, and I'm hoping tomorrow will be better. On the bright side, I know I can learn and do a new job all while dealing with a booty-ass neurological condition! Woohoo!
I've seen the phrase "bad tic day" bandied about on the Tweeter and in the Facebook groups I'm a member of. For the non-TS patient reading this, it's important to know that not every day with Tourette's is the same, the same way that not every person's Tourette's is the same. What is a bad tic day for me might be the best tic day of another person's life, and she may dance a jig and hit up ten clubs in one night while the same day leaves me sore and cranky. As in all things, "bad" is relative.
Oddly, I remember thinking for the last few days that I wasn't ticcing too badly. I woke up the same way. I haven't been sleeping well lately, which usually bodes a rough day for my tics. My mouth and jaw and eyebrows got going when I arrived at work, which is par for the course. To a passerby I probably would have looked mostly normal this morning, as long as you didn't have to hear my internal monologue. I've started calling my Tourette's voice Wesley Crusher, because he's so effing annoying. Ensign Crusher decided that while I was working, I should also be repeatedly, in my head, be spelling the last name of that poor journalist who was murdered in Saudi Arabia. Over and over and over, while counting the number of letters in his last name on the non-thumb fingers of my right hand each time. This is a good time to mention that I do manual labor at work. I really need Wesley to let me use my right hand whenever I need it. So for most of the morning, this was going on. I had the weird thought that, like I said, anyone else who saw me probably wouldn't know I had Tourette's. Does this constitute a good tic day? Like, am I getting away with it? This isn't really a condition-facing thought, but I couldn't help myself. It had been a bad internal tic day for ME. Unfortunately, I think a good percentage of the mental energy I burn up as a result of having Tourette's goes towards hiding it and worrying about how other people perceive me. Anyway, a lot of the morning was spent in a lengthy struggle to just get out of my head and be productive.
I've been learning a new position in work, which is awesome. I've been doing the same work for about five years now, and I needed a change. I'll still be doing a lot of my old work, but I'll be taking on this new work as well. A positive development, to be sure! The one drawback, which I'm sure some other TS patients can relate to, is that my Tourette's takes any new physical action as an open door for new/changed tics. I've always had a shoulder shrug, but the way I'm standing in a kind of confined space doing this new work has quickly made it my primary, and most painful, tic. As I'm typing, the area between my shoulder blades is aching like nobody's business. For the better part of my afternoon, my normally up-and-down shrug became my shoulder blades trying to meet over my spine. I'd do it five or six times in quick succession every minute or two. I couldn't wait to be out of there just so I could abandon the peculiar posture I assume while I'm doing that work. I felt every minute of my day, and all because of the Tourette's. It sucked. Every day isn't this bad, and I'm hoping tomorrow will be better. On the bright side, I know I can learn and do a new job all while dealing with a booty-ass neurological condition! Woohoo!
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