why do people with tics say bad words?

Question

I’m asking because this streamer has tics and a video is going around of her saying all of these bad words when she tics and people in the comments were sympathizing and some even were talking about how they can relate, so my question is why do people with tics say bad words when they tic and why does it seem common?

In: Biology

Answer 1

Disclaimer: I’m no doctor I just know someone who has been diagnosed with Tourettes.

The first thing to understand, Tourettes manifests in a lot of different ways…but generally speaking, to my understanding, most of the things that those who have it *do*, happen as a sort of compulsion they feel. Almost like an itch that goes away once they do that action. Verbal tics are surprisingly not as common as you may think, often times people can have vocal tics like coughing or clearing their throat – but not always verbal that include words. Other types of tics often include physical, anywhere from moving an arm or hitting something, to just moving your facial muscles in some way (like pulling up the corner of your mouth or something).

That said I don’t know why cursing is so common when it comes to verbal tics, but the reason it *appears* to be so common is because it’s very easy to notice. If someone is randomly saying curse words all the time you’re going to notice it, even if you aren’t looking at them. If they just have a small finger twitch or they do something with their head/face, you’re unlikely to notice it unless you are in a 1:1 conversation with them.

Generally speaking, the people you see with very flamboyant tics (don’t mean this in a negative way, just the ones that are more “showy”) are actually the outliers among those with Tourettes, it’s very possible you know someone who has it and only has very minor symptoms that you never noticed – they also may have never noticed them to a degree that they went to a doctor to look into it and don’t even know they have it.

I think I know the streamer you’re referring to, and to my knowledge she is more on the extreme end as far as Tourettes symptoms go (definitely seen worse, but I’ve seen many more minor cases too).