My family still doesn’t believe me; oh well. I was much older than you when I told them. I don’t know what I expected, but denial was not it! It didn’t help anything anyway, I don’t see how it can help because they don’t understand any of it. I wish I never told them really, now it’s just embarrassing.
I grew up in a pretty rural area so missed childhood diagnosis is not at that surprising. I would consciously try to suppress tics when I could feel tics coming. Sometimes successful sometimes not, but always ended with having a persistent headache and anxiety since I was about 13. I’m now 56. Went to school for multiple engineering degrees so introvert with strange/antisocial behavior not all that uncommon. Wife, a teacher, has been saying for years I was on the spectrum or had TS. During pandemic tics and headaches got much worst. Doctors thought it was brain tumor, Parkinson’s, etc. Eventually after everything else was ruled out I was diagnosed with TS. When I physically exhausted tics are greatly reduced. I wasn’t going to the gym and work was closed during pandemic which meant I wasn’t physically/mentally stimulated giving rise to more tics which I tried to suppress - hence more headaches. Work and exercise has reduced my tics again. Our friends/ family now know of diagnosis and are fine with it. Sometimes I still have verbal tics so I and pretty diligent to have my microphone off during teleconferences for work as I have a tendency blurt out stream of consciousness. One tic that has thankfully stopped recently was when ever someone said the world laser I would start making laser pew-pew sounds. Which is inconvenient because I am a laser physicist, so the world laser comes up a lot. Strangely, flying triggers tic attacks even though I am not at all nervous about flying. I think it is more the anxiety of being with a lot of people. When I fly I have a laminated card my doctor gave me that explains that I have TS. I usually will give the FA a heads up that I may blurt of crazy/unrelated things or sounds, whistles, etc. they are very understanding and appreciate the heads up. You have virtually no control, over your TS so why worry about it - it’s not like worrying would help. I think most people would be thankful of you told them about your situation.
Hey there. I was diagnosed in August at the age of 27. I noticed the onset 8 months prior, but now that I KNEW what a tic felt like I realized I had been doing them for years, they were just more subtle. I just didnt notice them until I started blinking and grunting uncontrollably as an adult.
I had even done them a lot AND was punished for them as a child. I dont think I was aware enough at the time to recognize them as tics. I also had very troubling ADHD and was regularly abused and neglected, so the adults in my life didnt recognize them either.
It really sucks that we're put into this position to be compelled to convince people the reality of our situation. Most people know that the vast majority of TS cases don't just appear randomly in one's life, but they're in a way born with it. Even though we have always had it, it just stings a little more to hear "I've never seen anything", because in their mind you didnt have tourettes last year, so why do you have it now? Especially with the whole TikTok fiasco right now...
I think I handled it pretty poorly, honestly. From my perspective, I'd been living with these huge questions my whole life that I finally had answers to. I wanted to tell everyone! From their perspective, I came home from the doctor and blurted, "I have Tourette's!" No surprise I mostly got, "Mmmmmkay and?" responses.
Most of my family took it at face value but one of my siblings didn't believe I had it. That really threw me. Like rationalguyforsure said, I really wasn't expecting denial! The irony is that the sibling who said there's no way I had TS *had more tics than me, growing up!* Fast forward ten or so years and they wound up in a therapist's office and have been diagnosed with a tic disorder and obsessive tendencies. Now it's just kind of taken as a given that we both have tics, which is pretty cool. I just wish it hadn't taken ten years of them being dismissive about it to get there.
On the whole fake-blaming thing, you *do* have a diagnosis. So yeah, they're welcome to their opinion, but until they go through all the medical training that your doctor has, and go through the entire diagnostic procedure with you as a trained and licensed medical professional, that's as far as it goes: it's their *opinion*. They're welcome to it, but they need to understand that you don't have to give it any more credence than you'd give their opinion on anything else.
In the end, though, it's entirely up to you whether you tell anyone, including family. If you don't think they're going to be receptive, that's their loss that they don't get to share this part of your life with you. Do what's right for you.
I think it can be helpful to approach the conversation with a sense of mild surprise. Like "I went to the doctor and it turns out those twitches were Tourette Syndrome. You learn something new every day, huh?" If you get the tone right, it will be socially awkward to argue with you or accuse you of faking.
My family still doesn’t believe me; oh well. I was much older than you when I told them. I don’t know what I expected, but denial was not it! It didn’t help anything anyway, I don’t see how it can help because they don’t understand any of it. I wish I never told them really, now it’s just embarrassing.
I grew up in a pretty rural area so missed childhood diagnosis is not at that surprising. I would consciously try to suppress tics when I could feel tics coming. Sometimes successful sometimes not, but always ended with having a persistent headache and anxiety since I was about 13. I’m now 56. Went to school for multiple engineering degrees so introvert with strange/antisocial behavior not all that uncommon. Wife, a teacher, has been saying for years I was on the spectrum or had TS. During pandemic tics and headaches got much worst. Doctors thought it was brain tumor, Parkinson’s, etc. Eventually after everything else was ruled out I was diagnosed with TS. When I physically exhausted tics are greatly reduced. I wasn’t going to the gym and work was closed during pandemic which meant I wasn’t physically/mentally stimulated giving rise to more tics which I tried to suppress - hence more headaches. Work and exercise has reduced my tics again. Our friends/ family now know of diagnosis and are fine with it. Sometimes I still have verbal tics so I and pretty diligent to have my microphone off during teleconferences for work as I have a tendency blurt out stream of consciousness. One tic that has thankfully stopped recently was when ever someone said the world laser I would start making laser pew-pew sounds. Which is inconvenient because I am a laser physicist, so the world laser comes up a lot. Strangely, flying triggers tic attacks even though I am not at all nervous about flying. I think it is more the anxiety of being with a lot of people. When I fly I have a laminated card my doctor gave me that explains that I have TS. I usually will give the FA a heads up that I may blurt of crazy/unrelated things or sounds, whistles, etc. they are very understanding and appreciate the heads up. You have virtually no control, over your TS so why worry about it - it’s not like worrying would help. I think most people would be thankful of you told them about your situation.
Hey there. I was diagnosed in August at the age of 27. I noticed the onset 8 months prior, but now that I KNEW what a tic felt like I realized I had been doing them for years, they were just more subtle. I just didnt notice them until I started blinking and grunting uncontrollably as an adult. I had even done them a lot AND was punished for them as a child. I dont think I was aware enough at the time to recognize them as tics. I also had very troubling ADHD and was regularly abused and neglected, so the adults in my life didnt recognize them either. It really sucks that we're put into this position to be compelled to convince people the reality of our situation. Most people know that the vast majority of TS cases don't just appear randomly in one's life, but they're in a way born with it. Even though we have always had it, it just stings a little more to hear "I've never seen anything", because in their mind you didnt have tourettes last year, so why do you have it now? Especially with the whole TikTok fiasco right now...
I think I handled it pretty poorly, honestly. From my perspective, I'd been living with these huge questions my whole life that I finally had answers to. I wanted to tell everyone! From their perspective, I came home from the doctor and blurted, "I have Tourette's!" No surprise I mostly got, "Mmmmmkay and?" responses. Most of my family took it at face value but one of my siblings didn't believe I had it. That really threw me. Like rationalguyforsure said, I really wasn't expecting denial! The irony is that the sibling who said there's no way I had TS *had more tics than me, growing up!* Fast forward ten or so years and they wound up in a therapist's office and have been diagnosed with a tic disorder and obsessive tendencies. Now it's just kind of taken as a given that we both have tics, which is pretty cool. I just wish it hadn't taken ten years of them being dismissive about it to get there. On the whole fake-blaming thing, you *do* have a diagnosis. So yeah, they're welcome to their opinion, but until they go through all the medical training that your doctor has, and go through the entire diagnostic procedure with you as a trained and licensed medical professional, that's as far as it goes: it's their *opinion*. They're welcome to it, but they need to understand that you don't have to give it any more credence than you'd give their opinion on anything else. In the end, though, it's entirely up to you whether you tell anyone, including family. If you don't think they're going to be receptive, that's their loss that they don't get to share this part of your life with you. Do what's right for you.
I think it can be helpful to approach the conversation with a sense of mild surprise. Like "I went to the doctor and it turns out those twitches were Tourette Syndrome. You learn something new every day, huh?" If you get the tone right, it will be socially awkward to argue with you or accuse you of faking.