Having Tourette's!

Another aspect about me that I feel is important to disclose to help readers understand how I became who I am, is the fact that I have Tourette's Syndrome.

When thinking of Tourette's, most people think of it being associated with uncontrollable outbursts of vulgarities. While I do not have this form of Tourette's, I have been known on occasion to lie and say that I do so I don't have to take responsibility for spewing out the "F" or "C" word now and again.

The Tourette's all began when I was around the age of two and I began swiveling my head around in a circular motion. For lack of a better way of describing the motion it is similar to what Stevie Wonder does with his head (although I do not personally know why or if he does this due to Tourette's).

While there are many difficulties in having Tourette's, the major issue I have is that 90% of the time I don't have a clue that my head is moving around. I say 90% because sometimes if I'm over emotional, whether in a positive or negative way, I can catch myself at the tail end of the cycle.

As of right now that is the only real issue I have with having Tourette's. However when I was younger it was very difficult and often traumatic, especially during grade school years, when I was constantly being teased.

But as I got older and the pubescent years arrived, I began to develop a thicker skin. Not that it made it that much easier because I was known to fight back and get into trouble for the fights. However it did get easier and I was able to laugh off the name calling and as well as retaliate in a more creative and less confrontational way, using with my own patterned wit and style, to the comments made about or at me.

There was one particular incident that sticks out to best describes how I can turn a negative name calling situation around.

Over the years the most common name or names I was called were either "Swivel Head" or "Stevie Wonder". However one particular kid in school, who's name escapes me, decided to refer to me as "Slush Puppy", since he thought the motion of my head was similar to the old Slush Puppy machines found in convenient stores. Now, my first instinct was to advise him that a person with a uni brow should not be making comments about an others abnormalities, however I digressed and took it a step further. At this point in my life I was getting tied of being called swivel head the majority of the time. So, I got up from my desk &I walked over the the teacher's desk and grabbed stack of gold stars and proceeded to thank him out loud for his wit originality and then proceeded to place one of the gold star right in the center of his uni-brow. So while this episode helped be deal with my abnormality, I was also able to help this student with his.