We all stumbled along, hoping for the best. (Many with Tourette syndrome also have attention deficit disorder, ADD attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD or obsessive-compulsive disorder, OCD.) And so along with the beginnings of facial twitches and rebellious behaviors came the attention span of a gnat.
I, like many people with Tourette syndrome, have a short attention span and some mild obsessive behaviors. He looked like me, but he was entering all of our lives in staccato bursts of behavior that I couldn’t predict, and over which I had very little control. At that time, social resources for conditions like mine were so few and far between that as my symptoms grew deeper, my mother and brother found themselves alone in the house with a virtual stranger. My mother realized that something was going on and that it was a disturbance deeper and stronger than anything behind Jeff’s youthful outbursts.īack then, Internet access was still a few years away, and there wasn’t much information available to answer her questions-or silence her fears. By the time I reached second grade, my relentless hyperactivity was understandably a huge concern at home. My fun seeking was much more frantic than Jeff’s, and my excitability level was much higher. Jeff, eighteen months younger, was a typical rambunctious boy-the kind who might be a pain to deal with sometimes, but who was otherwise like most boys.Īnd me? My energy levels were more manic. But the difference between Jeff and me was a question of intensity. At the mall, my younger brother, Jeff, and I were the kids who tore through clothing racks and down the aisles, and generally wore our mother out with our boyhood energy. To say that I was a very active kid is a complete understatement. By the time I was old enough to even realize that my parents were divorced, that’s just the way life was. My parents, Norman and Ellen, divorced very early in my life-so early, in fact, that unlike many children, I was far too young to think that the divorce had anything to do with me. LOUIS, Missouri, home of the Arch and home of Cardinals baseball.
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