Some Information on Recurrence of Tics in Adulthood

I'm reviewing some literature this morning on challenges with Tourette's/Tic diagnosis in adulthood. First off: there are many problems... absurdly many problems with the diagnostic process.

However, some things that I thought you all might like to know about:

1. Even when adults have experienced many years (or even decades) of remission of tics, they still can and often come back. We're getting a better understanding of how to predict when they'll come back and why, but that knowledge is in its infancy. Tics may lay dormant for 2-3 decades and re-emerge after age 60!

2. The prevalence rates for Tourette's/Tics in adulthood is way underreported. This is because many people learn how to adapt around their tics and live their lives without reporting significant distress or impairment - that means they report they don't have tics when asked. Even though if you actually video record them for a period of time, you'll see tics.

3. In reality, most adults experience tics throughout their life. They may show up in childhood, the individual continues living their life, they enter adulthood and tics are actually still present and continue to wax and wane and change over time.

4. Many people who receive treatment experience improvement in tic symptoms or impact from tics, but they may end up seeking treatment again later because either their tics got unexpectedly worse or there's a new tic they don't yet know how to deal with. Many people feel distressed and may worry they either did something wrong or the treatment didn't work before. More often neither of those are true, but because we (people with tics) don't know what to expect, it's hard to prepare for it.

Charles