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Vocal Tics - Humming


Dara

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Hi Everyone,

 

As I was putting my 5 year old son Karl to bed tonight I noticed that he was 'humming' or almost talking without opening his mouth while I was reading a book to him. I didn't notice it at all during the day today. During the last several months he has had: coughing, clearing the throat, grunting (not really a grunting sound but a noise that sounds like he's trying to clear mucus from his throat). Most of the time it would occur as a cough and then that mucus sound. I've never noticed him do a hum or anything of that nature. I'm terrified that this is another tic and have been crying to myself and my husband for the last two hours.

 

If anyone out there has a child with a similar experience, I would like to hear about the progression of the vocalizations. And does anyone have a suggestion as to a supplement that might help reduce the vocal tics? I've read that B6 and Zinc deficiencies could cause it?

 

Dara

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Dara, My son gets the humming tic off and on. The first time I heard him I shut myself in my bedroom and cried for 2 hours. He had other tics going on at the same time and that was just about all I could handle.

 

That was 3 years ago and now when my son starts humming it does not bother me at all. I wanted to fix it and make it all go away and I reasearch and research and over the years have found that with Tourettes (not a tic disorder but true Tourettes) the tics will come and go and change from one to another. I know that right now that does not help but IT WILL GET BETTER!!

 

I worried that once my son started making sounds such as humming that the screaming tics etc would be next but that has not happened and I have tried very hard to stop worrying about what the next tic will be.

 

My son takes supplements and it does help his tics stay very mild. I did notice that when my son has milk or anything with dairy that he hums alot more.

 

When we removed milk completely from his diet the humming stopped but he still will go through times when he feels the need to hum, espiecally when he is cold.

 

I hope things get better for you soon. I know how hard it can be to see our kids tic. I never thought I could handle it but by the grace of God I can finally see that this is not the end of the world. We have so much to be thankful for. Time will help you deal better with all of this. We have been dealing with TS, ADD, OCD and anxeity for 3 years. It will get better. Robin

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My son exhibited almost the exact same symptoms from the time he was 3 yrs. old (he is 14 now). He had this chronic, dry, forced cough, with the "humming" (he said that he was trying to clear his ears), "grunting" (said he had a tickle in his throat). We took him to several doctors who prescribed various allergy medicines & even asthma medication. Nothing worked! In the winter his dry cough was so frequent & sometimes it was so loud that it hurt my ears. A few years ago I picked up Doris Rapp's "Is this your child" and followed her ideas on allergy testing. First we tried the elimination diet as recommended by her. This was a very painful process (I called it the no-food-diet) and it takes a bit of time. I saw some horrible ticcing in reaction to sugar in particular and some other foods were suspect as well. After that we took him to an ENVIROMENTAL allergist as recommended by Doris Rapp. Instead of sticking you with a bunch of needles, down the back, in one fell swoop, environmental allergists test one potential allergen at a time. Again this takes much longer than the traditional way, but boy am I glad we did it. We found that he was highly allergic to cane sugar & chocolate, peanuts and oranges. He is also highly allergic to feathers & mold. He started allergy treatments almost 2 years ago and all of those "tics" are gone. We also removed all feather pillows from our home & try to avoid the foods that cause problems. Now there is no more humming, coughing, & grunting. He still has some other minor tics, but the removal of the allergens got rid of those symptoms. Hope this helps.

 

Sarah

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Dara,

 

My 8 year old is sitting next to me right now doing little shoulder shrugs, soft um um's and eyes twitching. He is my second son with tic's. My older son hummed so much in kindergarden (they couldn't figure out who was doing it) He didn't even know he was doing it. Like the others have said, they just come and go. I like the soft vocal tics because they don't hurt them like head shaking.

 

My older son went through one period of loud vocal tics, only at home at night when tired. It lasted a couple of weeks. This was heart breaking but passed rather quickly and has never happened again. That was several years after the humming.

 

This is kind of funny but the kids who play with my sons, who are quite mild, don't make fun of them, 2 kids in particular will start to imitate them. They will all be ridind their bikes throwing their heads back with their mouths open.

 

My guys have great self esteem, are leaders and very good students. I am so proud of both of them.

 

hellow dara this is kims son dont worry so much about your son my life is great i

have had ticks for about 2 years and it is fine for me. :wub:

Hang in there Dara. Kim

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:wub: Kim's son, what very good advice :wub:

 

dear Dara

 

I know how you feel but I really want to encourage you to try to not become too distressed over the tics. it is not going to help you or your son. Chrildren have an amazing ability to pick up on their parents emotions, and knowing that his tics are distressing you so will only put more pressure on him and that in turn makes the tics worse.

 

It is heartbreaking for any parent to realise that their is something different happening with their child, but believe me Dara, you can be very very thankful that the tics you are seeing are really very mild and not causing injury or debilitation.

 

There does seem to be a correlation between what others have found with humming and milk/dairy so dont know if that is relevant to your situation.

 

 

If you need to vent or cry......come here and let it out. We are all here for you and, because we have all had those feelings at one time or another, we really do understand

((((DARA)))))

:)

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My wife is impressed with how strong I am in this matter. I act as if nothing is happening and remind her to do the same for our son's self esteem. What she doesn't know is how when everyone is asleep, I cry a painful cry deep inside of my heart for the hurt is there, very much so, but so is the anger and I use that anger as energy for researching what is out there and what might help my kid. As for discussing the issue, I do not use the TS label with my son. We just talk about the tics and the food allergies either when he wants to or when I am preparing him in an informal way for a doctor's appointment or with his diet restrictions/supplement intake.

I hate this whole thing but our children only need to know is that we love them and are always there for them. Good Luck and use this forum as most of us do, to vent and to share.

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Dara,

Hi. I also wanted to say that my son made exactly the same noises that you described for your son. This was about 5 years ago that we noticed it. Sometimes he would make a low (quiet) humming sound, sometimes he'd just clear his throat, cough, and/ or grunt as if he was trying to clear mucous repeatedly from his throat. We also noticed that he was worse if he had dairy, so we tried to eliminate dairy from his diet. Several times though, he ate something with cream that we didn't know was there (Indian food which he loved), and the throat clearing was immediate and really strong - so I felt like we had proof that dairy was bothering him.

Much later, through testing with an environmental physician, we discovered that he had a big overgrowth of yeast and also an overgrowth of a bacteria called clostridia. We treated him for these and he has been taking supplements for about 4 years now. Though I think he may still have a some yeast overgrowth (it's very hard to get rid of), the tics he used to have are very very mild now and he can tolerate dairy with no problems now.

Phyl

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Robin,

 

I wish I could say my son's tics were a result of dairy, but he hasn't been on diary for over three months. It's so hard sometimes to figure out what is triggering the tics. I think my son's curent outbreak of tics is related to being in Florida all last week, the warm weather we're having in NJ and not staying the his diet 100% last week.

 

Dara

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Sarah,

 

It's funny how similar our sons food intolerances are. My son Karl tested positive for cane sugar, milk, eggs and oranges. Cooking and shopping are difficult. Karl also tested positive for fungus, mold and yeast which he is taking subligual drops to cure. It's a guessing game and we as parents just have to keep looking for the answers.

 

Dara

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Cheri,

 

About the 'humming'. Since I first noticed it this past Wednesday night, I still really only hear it when I'm reading to him at night before bed. It's usually when he's quite, which during the day is never, ha, ha. As a side note, Karl hasn't had any dairy in three months.

 

I agree with you about tryin not to get some upset about the current tics he's having. He's not injuring himself, thank god...Can you imagine how I'd be if that happened.

 

 

Take Care.

 

Dara

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Phyl,

 

Our son Karl first of all never liked dairy and hasn't had any dairy for three months, so I can't correlate dairy intake to the new humming tic. Do you like in NJ? Our son is currently under the care of an environmental MD who also discovered from an organic urine profile test (first morning urine) that Karl also has a yeast/fungal overgrowth of the gastrointestinal tract and Clostridia. How is your doctor treating it? Ours put our son on Nystatin - 1 tsp 3X's day. He takes it two weeks on and one week off. I'm really interested in this topic. Do you know of any qood books I could read about it?

 

 

Dara

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This wesite is a god send. It was just what I needed after having two doctors tell me to place my then 4 year old boy on heavy medication and to" go on with my life".

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