Moderately severe episode of my tic disorder w/ apnea

This is only a portion of my symptoms; I also sometimes get contractures, severe intentional tremor, mutism, etc. Maybe at some point I'll make a compilation video of all of them. Comment if this is something you'd want.

See http://bit.ly/saitwitch for the full info, and http://saizai.com/tic_cards.png for the summary info I carry with me in my wallet.

It's a non-Tourette's tic. I don't get vocal tics (other than air forced out by full upper torso spasm) or the like.

Most of the time I'm completely normal (neurologically at least); I only have symptoms during an episode. Those can last anywhere from 15 min to 8 hours and vary pretty widely in severity, from something you wouldn't even notice unless I pointed it out, to severe full body contractures, spasms, mutism, etc.

At the time of this video, I'm taking 0.25mg clonazepam 3/day. It helps significantly. It'll probably go up in dose; I've had negative side effects, so mainly just trying to figure out a good balance point.

This video is licensed CC by-nc-nd.

You're welcome to use it for medical demonstrations, so long as you email me info about your talk and credit the video to me. I can be reached at saizai.com.

I'm a grad student in social neuroscience, so ironically I find my own disorder a bit academically interesting.

Category:

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Tags:

• tic
• disorder

[ClumsyRoot]

Fascinating.

I have to wonder, have you ever seriously injured your neck?

[saizai]

@ClumsyRoot Nothing worse than residual soreness. Try holding a book out at arm's length, fully extended, for about 5 minutes straight. That'll approximate it.

[bornforwater]

...This might be a stupid question, but have you ever considered trying a brace for your neck when the sudden neck turning begins? Your muscles would still try to contract, but they'd be unable to. This might help them stop sooner. ... Or maybe not, I don't know.

[saizai]

@bornforwater I've braced my neck against things. It's mostly a bad idea though, just like it's a bad idea to put something in an eplipetic's mouth; my muscles will try to overcome resistance, and that could lead to injury. Sometimes I'll just keep my head in the contracted position to reduce the amount of travel, so it's just contracting in place. Hard to maintain though; the urge to keep your head straight is pretty strong.

[stockerman77]

I happened upon this video as I am subscribed to Theramin Trees, so without sounding hateful or arrogant, I watched this video with compassion for you, however, it had me thinking,..... your lucky in some sense that you live in the modern age of rationale and the scientific approach, leading to a diagnosis of a common genetic neurological disorder, rather then demonic possession like it may well have been diagnosed not too long ago. Just a thought.

Anyway,.. all the best for you.

[saizai]

@stockerman77 Definitely am lucky that I'm not killed on sight for this, and that there are some drugs that work. Would be luckier if those drugs were all legal.

[camaron334]

sorry man take pills or somting I feel for you

[DanielPowell357]

I go through the same shit man, Mine just more frequent and less severe. We must keep our heads up in this everyday fight.

[saizai]

@TheRationalizer Yes, it's scary. Triggers a scramble-away-from-choking reflex about a third of the time; I usually manage to control it, but panic at asphyxiation/drowning is kinda instinctual for humans. It's never lasted longer than a minute, though, so it's *probably* not going to kill me, and having a tracheotomy would be a way more severe impairment.