Upon further examination I was told that the medication had
triggered a previously hidden genetic disorder, Tourette's syndrome.Initially I suffered small leg twitches and sudden violent head and
neck whipping. Then throat clearing and uncontrolled grunting became common.
Eventually I found myself speaking words, and then shouting both words and phrases.
Fortunately most of the things that I hear myself shouting are rather odd,
rather than shocking or scandalous (see
list at right)
I learned over the years that having Tourette's means dealing with a
variety of changing symptoms. Anxiety and tiredness can make things
worse, as can drinking alcohol. |
Current*
Top Ten
Best Verbal Twitches:
1. Monkeys
2. Monkey Butts
3. Cockamamie
4. Plumpy
5. Boing! (since 1995)
6. Monkey Oh-Oh
7. Crumpton (a nearby town)
8. Clam Bake
9. Baby
10. Monkey F*@%er * new words
arrive (suddenly), and
old words sometimes fade |
|
Physical twitches, verbal twitches and
coprolalia, obsessive-compulsive
behavior, attention deficit problems, irritability, and exhaustion are a
few of the symptoms that I might experience daily. They sometimes increase in severity or go away for months at
a time.
When I was first diagnosed, I worked in a busy office
for a national organization near Washington, DC. After five or six
hours under buzzing fluorescent lights trying to answer several phone
lines while entering data and trying to get the printer to work I was a
wreck.
Working at Renaissance
Festivals, as I now do, having tourettes can be
a strange gift. I usually work in front of our shop,
building marionettes and trying to attract attention to our creations. I merely let my defenses down and
sooner or later odd words begin to flow from my lips. Sometimes I
twitch a song in gibberish and other times I can't resist the urge to
repeatedly spin in circles. It's liberating to just let it go and
see what it wants to do. |
Eric's
Past Great Twitches
Toast
Dick!
Butter
Oh Boy
Cram it, Clown!
Mine
Pork
Soapy Doe Doe
Toe-zer
Calendula
Trollops
Bunk
Rump
Mumford
Crappies
Punkinhead
France
Lumbar
Co-lum-bia
Plotnik Many friends of
mine have told me that they "miss" some of my old twitches that
have waned. |
|
It's a
very interesting phenomena, like playing improvisational comedy games with
myself. I might suddenly sing out "BOING!" with
such volume and intensity that it startles people walking by (and usually
myself as well). Often when I let loose with a big verbal twitch in
public I catch peoples eyes smiling at me quizzically as if waiting for an
explanation - or for the second part of the joke to be played out.
It would be a shame to leave them hanging, so I find myself following up
many twitches with an improvised punch line, or a second verse to the song.
It's exhausting to stay that focused but easier than trying to hold the
twitches in, and it definitely draws attention to our Shoppe! You
can see for yourself at the Maryland
Renaissance Festival, where I will be stringing marionettes and
performing spontaneously and sporadically in front of our booth on
weekends starting in August, 2005. |
