Speaker 1: Just a warning. This episode does contain quite a lot
Speaker 1: of course language, but the vast majority is not swearing.
Speaker 1: It's vocal tics that come with Tourette syndrome.
Speaker 2: You need to fuck you find the match. As you
Speaker 2: find the match, you can get us sucked. You get
Speaker 2: like four suck in a road, like going down for
Speaker 2: that way.
Speaker 1: You're listening to a little girl called Fife. She was
Speaker 1: eight at the time. This is part of her home video,
Speaker 1: filmed two years ago, You.
Speaker 2: Can't go this way, all this way, that way.
Speaker 1: Fife is one of the most creative and charismatic ten
Speaker 1: year olds I've ever met. She's passionate, she's joyful, and
Speaker 1: she has a diagnosis of ADHD and Tourette syndrome. On
Speaker 1: my finger's going there, yep, I see, Oh my goodness.
Speaker 2: One was my second one.
Speaker 3: That one was my third one.
Speaker 1: Five likes to make things, lots of things, including finger puppets,
Speaker 1: and just let me try one on for size. These
Speaker 1: are not run of the mill finger puppets. They're the
Speaker 1: work of a kid with serious talent. Not only are
Speaker 1: they functional, they're beautiful. Did you have to look something
Speaker 1: up to know how?
Speaker 3: I just guessed on how to make them.
Speaker 4: You're so clever.
Speaker 3: I was the hardest to make.
Speaker 1: Where did you get the inspiration for that? Just in
Speaker 1: your head. I'm diving into the complex and fascinating world
Speaker 1: of neurodiversity. I'm not an expert, but my daughter is
Speaker 1: neurodivergent and a few years ago I was diagnosed with ADHD.
Speaker 1: In this series, you'll hear from expert and from many
Speaker 1: wonderful people who experience the world in a unique way.
Speaker 1: We're looking at neurodiversity from the inside. Gelder, I'm Sonya Gray,
Speaker 1: and this is no such thing as normal.
Speaker 5: Series two.
Speaker 1: Tourette syndrome. We all know what it is, or we
Speaker 1: think we do, but Turets is routinely misrepresented and largely misunderstood.
Speaker 1: Most people associated with compulsive swearing or obscene language, but
Speaker 1: only about ten percent of those with Turets have this
Speaker 1: particular trait. This is a complex neurological condition that often
Speaker 1: comes with social rejection and discrimination. In this episode, we
Speaker 1: hear what it's like to have a tic disorder like
Speaker 1: Tourettes and why so little is known about a condition
Speaker 1: that can be so debilitating. Along with ten year old five,
Speaker 1: you'll hear from TikTok, sensation, late and clack better known
Speaker 1: as uncle ticks. Those who live with tourette shouldn't be
Speaker 1: defined by it. They are so much more than the
Speaker 1: tics we see and hear.
Speaker 3: I've got like somewhere I like, I've go like I
Speaker 3: like that, and then some people think I'm like going
Speaker 3: like oh, And then when we're like listening to like something,
Speaker 3: can I go like people think I'm like saying like
Speaker 3: whoaw or something?
Speaker 1: But can you feel them coming on?
Speaker 4: Yah?
Speaker 1: It sounds like everybody at school was pretty good about them?
Speaker 1: Are they They understand because everyone's different.
Speaker 3: It's just some of the sexes.
Speaker 1: Did they make fun of you or teasing?
Speaker 3: Don't make fun of me. They just don't really understand.
Speaker 3: And like some em think I'm just making annoying noises, yeah,
Speaker 3: and just being annoying and destructive, say like like that thing,
Speaker 3: I would go like, I'd get my head and if
Speaker 3: I was like angry and upset, I would literally just
Speaker 3: go like bang and push my head on it really well.
Speaker 1: And you couldn't stop doing that. You couldn't stop yourself
Speaker 1: doing that. Yeah, wow, do you remember it?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I remember doing it. I remember doing it in
Speaker 3: my mom's bathroom on the sink. I remember, just like
Speaker 3: going out when I get like I'd do it when
Speaker 3: I was like really upset and angry and sad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh, poor thing.
Speaker 3: I don't do it anymore, thank god.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what is the worst teck? The one that if
Speaker 1: you could take it away, you would h.
Speaker 3: That if word?
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 3: Because when I'm in class or I in score, people
Speaker 3: think I'm like just saying it on.
Speaker 1: Purpose because you're not choose. You're not actually swearing, are you.
Speaker 5: It's just a tick?
Speaker 1: Is there certain times in the school day where you
Speaker 1: do it more like.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like at lunch or morning tea with my friends,
Speaker 3: because they don't really they don't care. They're fine with it,
Speaker 3: and they support me in there. They don't care.
Speaker 1: You're not ticking at the moment.
Speaker 3: Holding them men.
Speaker 1: Oh, don't hold them in, darling. I don't want you
Speaker 1: to feel like you have to suppress them with me.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when you're at home, you don't feel like you
Speaker 1: have to suppress your tick saying yeah, it can just
Speaker 1: be yourself. Fife is lucky to have a super supportive
Speaker 1: school and family. We'll hear from her mam Amanda later
Speaker 1: in the episode, she describes the last few years in
Speaker 1: the road they've been on with Fife Maltourettes are still
Speaker 1: super challenging. There is a general understanding now that these tics,
Speaker 1: even the vocal ones, are not a choice, and that
Speaker 1: growth and awareness is in part to visibility those people
Speaker 1: who are loudly and proudly owning their turettes.
Speaker 4: No fow fuck and terrible, fucking terrible man.
Speaker 1: You're right today.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've been good. I've just been busy. Yeah, fucking
Speaker 4: busy man. You always busy most days? Yeah, most days
Speaker 4: I'm running around like a headless chicken.
Speaker 1: It's likely if you're on TikTok you'll know Leyton Clark
Speaker 1: as Uncle Ticks. You might even be one of his
Speaker 1: four point six million TikTok followers. Layton is very funny
Speaker 1: on TikTok, but he's also brutally honest about the profound
Speaker 1: physical and mental challenges that turets brings and how hard
Speaker 1: it was for him growing up with a multitude of
Speaker 1: socially unacceptable tics. TikTok is his full time gig now,
Speaker 1: but he also shared his story on a wonderful local
Speaker 1: TV show, Living with Turetts. You just come across as
Speaker 1: this beautiful, kind hearted soul.
Speaker 4: I appreciate that. I try.
Speaker 1: Well, it seems genuine, is it.
Speaker 4: I mean, try and be genuine every day and humble
Speaker 4: from where you're from.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and people I imagine when you were growing up,
Speaker 1: you know, because Turett's is what it is, and you
Speaker 1: say things that aren't you. They wouldn't have maybe seen
Speaker 1: people that didn't really know you, would have just seen.
Speaker 4: Everyone else seems to have opinions. It's all good. I
Speaker 4: don't really care have your opinions.
Speaker 1: It's funny, yeah, but it's hard for a little lady.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah it was. Yeah, I did. It broke my
Speaker 4: heart depressed when I was younger.
Speaker 1: How was your childhood terrible?
Speaker 4: I had a really good upbringing from parents, but I
Speaker 4: had a shift time at school and all that I
Speaker 4: was always bullied in gave me a real hard skin.
Speaker 4: That's what I find comedy and dark humor and shit
Speaker 4: really funny now. But growing up with Tretts was hard.
Speaker 4: I little affect me when I was really young, but
Speaker 4: then when I got older, I just didn't really give
Speaker 4: a shit.
Speaker 1: So did you get do you reckon? You got to
Speaker 1: that point where you're just like you know what, this
Speaker 1: is it, this is me. Nothing anyone can say anymore
Speaker 1: can hurt me.
Speaker 4: Yeah, pretty much. I've had it all. Anything that nothing
Speaker 4: really offends me. You know, people come up to and
Speaker 4: see she all the time.
Speaker 1: But because look, I know very little, it turns out
Speaker 1: about Tourette syndrome, tik disorders. It's been a deep dive
Speaker 1: for me and I'm just like, WHOA, how did I not?
Speaker 1: How was I so ignorant to the.
Speaker 4: Experience, ignorance, blicit, You're just none the wiser, not.
Speaker 1: Really understanding the extent of turets. It's not just about
Speaker 1: the vocal texts and stuff. It's the Yeah, it's the
Speaker 1: pain throwing.
Speaker 4: My head around that's going to that's going to be
Speaker 4: sort of into the.
Speaker 1: There's an element of mystery that surrounds turets. And if
Speaker 1: you dig into the academic papers, as I did, you'll
Speaker 1: find there are contradictions even in the research. So I
Speaker 1: seek out an expert and start with the basics.
Speaker 4: What is it.
Speaker 6: Tourette syndrome as a diagnostic category is the present over
Speaker 6: time of a combination of symptoms.
Speaker 1: That's Hillary Mack. He's a clinical psychologist with a special
Speaker 1: interest in tick disorders and Tourette syndrome.
Speaker 6: So if you have multiple motor techs, say eye twitching
Speaker 6: and throat clearing, and at least one vocal tech which
Speaker 6: might be that there's a hum or aus squeak sound,
Speaker 6: and that those symptoms have all continued for at least
Speaker 6: twelve months, then we say that you've got tourettes.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I found trying to research
Speaker 1: it is there's not a this is what it is, yes,
Speaker 1: and this is why. Yes.
Speaker 6: So even if you look into the scientific literature that
Speaker 6: we're still in the process of trying to figure out
Speaker 6: exactly what's going on in the brain for people who
Speaker 6: have techs and turets. We know some of the main
Speaker 6: regions involved, we know tics are inherited, yet we're still
Speaker 6: in the process of trying to really get to the
Speaker 6: bottom of exactly why. In terms of the I guess
Speaker 6: the phenomenology of it, like a tick is a tick,
Speaker 6: whether we're talking about a functional tick disorder or trick syndrome.
Speaker 1: Right, because a lot of kids and adults do have tics,
Speaker 1: At what point is it crossover to a disorder?
Speaker 6: Very good question. So ticks are common about one in
Speaker 6: eight children will have a tick at some point in
Speaker 6: their lives, and so for the most part, we should
Speaker 6: be viewing ticks as just a common and ordinary part
Speaker 6: of child development. We start to view ticks as problematic
Speaker 6: at that point of kind of frequency. They're happening enough
Speaker 6: and there's enough tics that they're beginning to have an
Speaker 6: impact on that young person's life. Another reason might be
Speaker 6: that the specific ticcks that people have got might cause
Speaker 6: them physical pain, or the social impact of some texts
Speaker 6: becomes sufficient that we want to diagnose and then better
Speaker 6: able to support that person.
Speaker 1: Layton Clark is thirty years old now. He's spent most
Speaker 1: of his life trying to suppress his tics. School and
Speaker 1: workplaces are not super welcoming of an appropriate language, even
Speaker 1: if it's involuntary. Before he blew up on TikTok, Layton
Speaker 1: was a wedding videographer, which I find intriguing because a
Speaker 1: loud tickstorm through the wedding vows would be less than ideal,
Speaker 1: and I wonder how he managed it.
Speaker 4: What do I used to do? Good question? Back in
Speaker 4: the day. I used to suppress them, harden and go
Speaker 4: at the back tick for like fuck nof now yeah shit,
Speaker 4: But it was the only way to pay my bills.
Speaker 1: I'm just trying to get an idea of what it
Speaker 1: feels like for you when you're suppressing your tics. Is
Speaker 1: that painful?
Speaker 4: Painful and a mental sense, yes, and sometimes in a
Speaker 4: physical but more mentally opposed.
Speaker 1: Yeah, question, Yeah, having to read as a care Did
Speaker 1: you get any help support?
Speaker 4: No, there was nothing. There's nothing in the nineties, early
Speaker 4: two thousands, there's no support from any government funding. There's
Speaker 4: still no support now. It's not seen as a disability here, No,
Speaker 4: but I reckon it should be because some days, oh
Speaker 4: like tech and I can't walk or struggle us going
Speaker 4: to get a bread is fucking hard. So maybe even
Speaker 4: just for example, having a disability, parking would be handy
Speaker 4: for people like me.
Speaker 1: So you can't have access to that.
Speaker 4: No, No, I never have been able to have access.
Speaker 4: But I'm just thinking about other people more than myself.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you get out and you do, but there
Speaker 1: are a lot of people I'm kissing that withdrawal from
Speaker 1: the world because every time you go out, it's like
Speaker 1: you just don't know what you're going to face, and.
Speaker 4: Or not so much not what you're going to face.
Speaker 4: You just don't know what text's going to kick in
Speaker 4: and you don't know how you're going to be, or
Speaker 4: if you can just go up to that door and
Speaker 4: go and grab your avocados for your toast, you know
Speaker 4: what I mean.
Speaker 1: Latian Clark no longer suppresses his ticks. It's quite something
Speaker 1: to sit with a person who's not exactly sure what
Speaker 1: his body's going to do or what's going to come
Speaker 1: out of his mouth. I imagined and involuntary vocal tick would
Speaker 1: be distinct from someone's regular speech, but it's not that
Speaker 1: clear cut.
Speaker 4: Most disabled people recognize me, so we get along pretty well.
Speaker 4: Like a house on fire, or like a fat bitch
Speaker 4: and a bakery. That's a bad one, but you know
Speaker 4: what's going a tick when you see that fat batches
Speaker 4: and bakeries.
Speaker 1: So there was a tick before, but then you just
Speaker 1: repeated it again and it wasn't.
Speaker 4: Is that right? Yeah that wasn't. I just repeated what
Speaker 4: I said.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4: It's one of my number one tick traits. Oh fuck yeah,
Speaker 4: not that I can help. That just happens.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's fascinating. You might be thinking, hmm, I don't
Speaker 1: think that was a tick, But think about shrugging or
Speaker 1: throat clearing. Those are motor ticks that can look just
Speaker 1: like conscious movement.
Speaker 4: I have a terrible tick, old barket, fat woman. It
Speaker 4: just happens, but I can't help him. It just comes
Speaker 4: down and only woman too, not men. Tell you, woman,
Speaker 4: I don't know why.
Speaker 1: So it's almost like it's like you've got all a twin,
Speaker 1: a twin that's just.
Speaker 4: Like sitting on my shoulder saying buck No, I don't
Speaker 4: want to woman.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, And I'm not saying that that's you, But
Speaker 1: it's like we've all got that in there somewhere that
Speaker 1: we want to say it.
Speaker 4: But we just I just have to laugh. You just
Speaker 4: got to laugh.
Speaker 1: It's a tough one because any woman who hears a
Speaker 1: man barking at her is going to be upset and angry.
Speaker 1: Possibly it's going to ruin her day. Would it make
Speaker 1: any difference of he knew that he had to read
Speaker 1: and it was unintentional, I think so, I don't know.
Speaker 1: For latent, it must be extremely hard. He has to
Speaker 1: take responsibility for causing offense, but it's not really him.
Speaker 1: Do you find a lot of your life has been
Speaker 1: saying sorry.
Speaker 4: Ah, shitchy? I say it all the time to people.
Speaker 1: So you're but basically you're apologizing for something that you
Speaker 1: have no control over.
Speaker 4: Yeah, because it just makes people feel better about themselves
Speaker 4: at the end of the day. And I am sorry
Speaker 4: because I'm oh, fuck, I just called you a fat bitch.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: But sometimes are you like I don't want to have
Speaker 1: to keep saying sorry. I don't want to have to
Speaker 1: keep apologizing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I guse It just is what it is
Speaker 4: with the disability, and I don't mind saying it.
Speaker 1: There is a lot of sorry, sorry, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1: But what we don't see is the work that goes
Speaker 1: in beforehand to reduce the impact on others. For example,
Speaker 1: Layton is never sure what his body is going to do.
Speaker 1: He has to be constantly aware of his proximity to
Speaker 1: other people, basically so he doesn't hurt anyone. When he's
Speaker 1: taking a plane flight, Leyton makes sure in advance that
Speaker 1: there's a vacant seat in front of him, because no
Speaker 1: one appreciates a foot in the back or a knock
Speaker 1: on the head. He tells me about a recent incident
Speaker 1: with a flight attendant who decided to override his seating
Speaker 1: requests and then didn't appreciate his vocal tics.
Speaker 4: I told her it was a neurological dysfunction in my brain.
Speaker 4: Three or four times I explained to what Tourettes was
Speaker 4: blah blah blah as much as I could. I told
Speaker 4: her it was like, I have a disability and I
Speaker 4: can't help making those sounds of noises or swear words.
Speaker 4: And then after that, after I explain it what it was,
Speaker 4: she goes, yeah, but can you just stop swearing? It's wrong?
Speaker 1: Just stop swearing. If only it was that easy, which
Speaker 1: leads me back to psychologist Hillary mac with the million
Speaker 1: dollar question what's actually going on with this swearing tick?
Speaker 6: So it's one of the ones that stands out to people.
Speaker 6: It's also relatively rare, so only about one in ten people.
Speaker 1: So why though, why is it swear words? Why is
Speaker 1: it the words that you really shouldn't say that are
Speaker 1: the ones that come out.
Speaker 6: I feel a little unsure about answering that, because actually
Speaker 6: we don't really quite fully know.
Speaker 1: Kudos to Hillary for being a professional. He didn't want
Speaker 1: to comment on anything that wasn't in the literature, and
Speaker 1: he's right. There are many hypotheses, but not a lot
Speaker 1: of agreement by researchers as to why some people have
Speaker 1: the swearing tick known as coprolalia, which can extend to
Speaker 1: obscenities and racial slurs. It is important to know that
Speaker 1: there's no thought or emotion behind these outbursts. Basically, it's
Speaker 1: the brain traying itself. So what about tick disorders in general?
Speaker 1: You'd think there could be an emotional or traumatic basis
Speaker 1: for those, but that's not the case either. Things like
Speaker 1: stress and anxiety well potentially exacerbate tics, but they're not
Speaker 1: the cause of the tics, are they?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Very much so well put so, you can definitely experience
Speaker 6: more of your texts when stressed and anxious, but those
Speaker 6: aren't the causes in themselves, and that a TECH isn't
Speaker 6: a sign that someone is stressed or anxious. In fact,
Speaker 6: some people might experience their texts more frequently when they're
Speaker 6: quite relaxed.
Speaker 1: So what we do know for sure is that Tourette
Speaker 1: syndrome rarely travels alone. There's a strong connection with ADHD
Speaker 1: and OCD. Let Clark has both these diagnoses, and I
Speaker 1: ask him if the ADHD has much of an impact
Speaker 1: on his life.
Speaker 4: Hugely. I guess it's one of those you know, make
Speaker 4: up in the morning. You try and do ten things,
Speaker 4: but you when you get three of them done. That's
Speaker 4: how I kind of see it.
Speaker 1: What about OCD, have you got any Yep?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I used to be. Yeah. Sometimes it's real bad
Speaker 4: fucking I'll struggle because of it. I'll be hard out
Speaker 4: into my OCD for a week and then it will
Speaker 4: disappear come back in a month. I'd refuse to sleep
Speaker 4: in my bed because I don't want to make it dirty.
Speaker 4: Pretty interesting though.
Speaker 1: Right, it is interesting, But it's a lot for one
Speaker 1: person to deal with ADHD and OCD on top of
Speaker 1: the turettes compulsive and impulsive. I ask psychologists Tillery if
Speaker 1: these are common color curring conditions.
Speaker 6: Well, definitely extremely common, in that people with significant texts
Speaker 6: at some point in their lives as a ninety percent
Speaker 6: chance they'll have some struggles with ADHD and or OCD.
Speaker 6: And we think that's because the the parts of the
Speaker 6: brain that are involved in all those conditions are very
Speaker 6: very similar, what we call shared etiologies, so the underlying
Speaker 6: factors and pathways. So it does mean that people with
Speaker 6: TECKS are way more likely to also be struggling with
Speaker 6: something else. That's quite hard or challenging.
Speaker 5: So shared etiology.
Speaker 1: I have ADHD, I don't have tics, but what is
Speaker 1: the sort of similarity in the brain? Am I trying
Speaker 1: to make sense of something that's not easily made sense of.
Speaker 6: We're very kind of complex organisms, us human beings. Our
Speaker 6: brain is having to do a lot to constantly regulate
Speaker 6: every aspect of our functioning. There's this important pathway, you
Speaker 6: could call it the pathway of motor control in the brain.
Speaker 6: It's likely involved in the various things that we're talking about,
Speaker 6: including texts or compulsions or some of the impulse control
Speaker 6: stuff that goes on for people with ADHD.
Speaker 1: There's a real sense that I get, having just started
Speaker 1: looking into this, that there's a lot we don't know.
Speaker 1: Would I be right?
Speaker 6: That is absolutely the case, and even more so with
Speaker 6: texts and turetts, that we are still very much in
Speaker 6: the process of trying to figure out exactly what's going
Speaker 6: on in our wonderful and immensely complicated human brains.
Speaker 1: You heard from ten year old five at the top
Speaker 1: of this episode. She's a really wonderful kid who just
Speaker 1: happens to have ADHD and Tourette syndrome. Her mum Amanda
Speaker 1: tells me how it all played out.
Speaker 7: It wasn't actually until she was about seven.
Speaker 1: She started making.
Speaker 7: Like little sounds, like little beeps and squeaks, and doing
Speaker 7: little shrugs and stretching her mouth. Honestly, we just thought
Speaker 7: Fife was just being.
Speaker 5: Expressive.
Speaker 7: We just thought she's just so creative. And then her
Speaker 7: teacher said to me, hey, I think she's ticking. And
Speaker 7: then we started really paying attention, and then we were like, oh, wow,
Speaker 7: this is like a repetitive thing. They're morphing all the time,
Speaker 7: they're coming, they're going. So we took it to the doctor,
Speaker 7: and you know, surprise, surprise, the gp knew absolutely nothing
Speaker 7: about ticks or Tourette's or your audiversity to just brush
Speaker 7: us off. And so we decided to go on a
Speaker 7: wait list to see a child psychologist, which was at
Speaker 7: the time eighteen months.
Speaker 1: But I just asked, did she seem happy at the time?
Speaker 1: So happy. Yeah, she's always been. She's always been. Really
Speaker 1: she has a really high.
Speaker 7: Self esteem, you know what. She thinks of herself as
Speaker 7: the most important thing, especially with something as confronting as Churette's.
Speaker 1: But then she.
Speaker 7: Developed what we call the fuck tick. All of a sudden,
Speaker 7: she just started saying fuck over and over and over.
Speaker 7: And she'd never been a kid that swore, so it
Speaker 7: felt really cruel. It was also quite loud and it
Speaker 7: would come out with like a force that almost made
Speaker 7: her sound like she was angry. That was when we
Speaker 7: started to really panic because we were like, okay, this
Speaker 7: is actually hard, like, you know, taking her out in public.
Speaker 7: People don't understand. People are staring at her. That's making
Speaker 7: her more anxious. But we couldn't get any help. We
Speaker 7: just couldn't get any help at all. We just kept
Speaker 7: getting on huge waiting lists to see child psychologists who
Speaker 7: specialize in this area, and we just were lost. We
Speaker 7: didn't know what to do, and we were feeling pretty desperate.
Speaker 7: And then her dad one night, he just decided to
Speaker 7: video her doing it.
Speaker 1: That video is the one you heard at the beginning
Speaker 1: of the episode.
Speaker 2: Keep Finding Them Lunch.
Speaker 7: And he sent the video actually to our now psychiatrist.
Speaker 7: And our psychiatrist who had told us he couldn't see
Speaker 7: us for eighteen months, watched the video called us the next
Speaker 7: day and he said, I'll see you in a week.
Speaker 7: And ever since then, yeah, he's been our psychiatrist. And
Speaker 7: he's been amazing, but we we spent probably ten grand yeah,
Speaker 7: just in the first year of life's diagnosis, and it
Speaker 7: kind of just broke my heart because we can afford
Speaker 7: to and I just I can't even All I can
Speaker 7: remember is how desperate I felt to want to help
Speaker 7: her and if I hadn't have been in the position
Speaker 7: to be able to get that help and.
Speaker 1: Pay for it.
Speaker 7: There is just so many families, but if you think
Speaker 7: even half of those people probably can't afford to get
Speaker 7: the proper help, it's heartbreaking.
Speaker 1: It really is heartbreaking. And despite having access to great support.
Speaker 1: Amanda's daughter Fife, has been through a lot in the
Speaker 1: last few years. But this is a very special kit,
Speaker 1: very in tune with other people's feelings. She loves people
Speaker 1: and she loves her friends.
Speaker 3: So yeah, and then she's just like calmly reading the book,
Speaker 3: and I'm just like, not my first ever a friend,
Speaker 3: but like someone who's really special to me.
Speaker 1: You have a lot of empathy. Do you know what
Speaker 1: empathy means?
Speaker 3: They probably did, but I forgot. Oh, I just don't
Speaker 3: know what it means.
Speaker 1: Well, what it means is that you really care about people,
Speaker 1: and if someone's upset then you're one of the first
Speaker 1: people to see if they're okay.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you feel other people's sadness. Yeah, you don't like
Speaker 1: people being sad.
Speaker 3: And they don't make seeing people get hurt as well.
Speaker 3: It makes me feel better that I think about that
Speaker 3: all day and I start crying because I.
Speaker 1: Feel really bad. Oh. It's a lovely quality to care
Speaker 1: about people. It's the most important thing. Lighton Clark cares
Speaker 1: about people too. On his uncle Tick's TikTok account, there
Speaker 1: are numerous posts if him stopping and chatting to strangers
Speaker 1: and really listening to them.
Speaker 4: No, Ma, how am I please get in here right now,
Speaker 4: specially on the street. I love talking to people. I
Speaker 4: love talking to people.
Speaker 1: I love how you are with people, like in your
Speaker 1: videos and like the airport, you're having a shit time
Speaker 1: by just the way you were that it was stressful,
Speaker 1: like from the minute you walked in, and yet people
Speaker 1: were like hey, uncle texts and you're like, get cold
Speaker 1: a nice to me. You know, you were really with them.
Speaker 1: It's very powerful what you're doing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, fuck fuck. I never used to see it like
Speaker 4: that though.
Speaker 1: What would you like people to know about turettes? This
Speaker 1: is a I know it's a really broad question, but
Speaker 1: I think you know there there's a little bit of
Speaker 1: voyeurism sometimes with Tourett's and a little bit of like, oh, come,
Speaker 1: I do something to make me laugh, you know, not
Speaker 1: not actually the internal experience and what I want to
Speaker 1: take you.
Speaker 5: He has quite a lot.
Speaker 1: He wants to tell me things you don't think about,
Speaker 1: like eating and drinking can be hard. He can't really
Speaker 1: go to the movies. He's always disturbing people, and now
Speaker 1: being a celebrity means he's very conspicuous.
Speaker 4: I'm going to a concert tomorrow night. Quite a nervous
Speaker 4: about it. Could I don't know how it's going to go.
Speaker 1: Can you disguise yourself?
Speaker 4: Not really, because I'm a loud true? How the fun
Speaker 4: is supposed to fucking high bed?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true, that's true. Are you I don't think
Speaker 1: about that. I was just thinking about it. You can
Speaker 1: put them a star shup.
Speaker 4: Fuck. I could wear that to Moorroment. Might work. Covers
Speaker 4: your face, that's funny.
Speaker 1: There's no way and no where to hide, and there's
Speaker 1: another layer to have this. Wearing tick coprolalia as a
Speaker 1: young parkerha girl is hard enough, but for Layton the
Speaker 1: ticks feed into a certain stereotype. Being Maldy and male
Speaker 1: and having to Rette must have been hard.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah it is. Yeah, it's a reality. Yep,
Speaker 4: that I face. I know you might go, oh, most
Speaker 4: people are really be accepting these days, but they're only
Speaker 4: accepting now because I know who I am.
Speaker 1: Layton's faced a lot of rejection in his life, but
Speaker 1: having a strong cultural identity gives them a sense of belonging.
Speaker 1: What is being Maori mean to you? How important is there?
Speaker 4: What does it mean to me? Means the fucking world.
Speaker 4: I'm proud to be Maldy. It's our identity, as like
Speaker 4: people used to be proud when I was younger because
Speaker 4: I was always frowned upon to be Moldy. But now
Speaker 4: I'm much super I'm real, real rap around from King
Speaker 4: Country hard. You know. I grew up in a hearty,
Speaker 4: moldy household that helped me when I was younger.
Speaker 1: As a kid, Laden was accepted by as famo and
Speaker 1: on his mud eye. It's a shame that acceptance wasn't
Speaker 1: universal because any problem with Tourette's doesn't lie with the individual.
Speaker 1: It's an onlookers thing. It's the rest of us. Who
Speaker 1: are disturbed or confused by behavior we just don't see
Speaker 1: as normal. The hope for five's mum, Amanda, is a
Speaker 1: society that welcomes her daughter's differences. A tick neutral world.
Speaker 7: There's this expectation on how we're all supposed to behave.
Speaker 7: That's where we need more awareness. We need people to
Speaker 7: understand that where all individuals were all unique. So if
Speaker 7: we can just all be a little bit more understanding
Speaker 7: about that, then yeah, she can up and jump and
Speaker 7: beep and do the peace sign and occasionally swear and
Speaker 7: it's totally fine.
Speaker 1: This is the last episode in this series of No
Speaker 1: Such Thing as Normal. Thank you so much for listening
Speaker 1: and for your support. If you like the series, please
Speaker 1: rate and review it and share it with anyone who
Speaker 1: you think might benefit from this copepper. No Such Thing
Speaker 1: as Normal is produced and presented by me Sonia Gray.
Speaker 1: The editor is Jamie Lee Smith. Owen O'Connor and Mitchell
Speaker 1: Hawks are executive producers. Production assistant is Beck's War. You
Speaker 1: can find us on Instagram No Such Thing as Normal Podcast.
Speaker 1: The series is brought to you by the New Zealand
Speaker 1: Herald and Team Uniform and it's made with the support
Speaker 1: of New Zealand on air two