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[wesimkins]

I am so grateful for finding this forum. Your posts have been such a comfort in navigating this new and scary journey. My name is Windy, I have an almost seven year old son who has recently developed tics. Over the past six months we had been searching for the causes of his chronic fatigue, circles under his eyes and general ill feeling most of the time. A few weeks ago he developed his first (there are more now) tic. It is a full head jerk, always on one side. They can be every few seconds some of the time. He has now begun rapid eye blinking, and a funny stretch of the mouth. Before the tics our doctor did a full slurry of blood work that showed no abnormalities except for an increase in his liver enzyme but that was not enough to warrant concern. He was also tested for 12 food allergies that came up empty expect the bloodwork showed he was definitely allergic to "something". We then tried skin testing and again we came up blank but three days later the tics appeared. Three days after that he suffered his first asthma attack. I have to believe there is a connection to it all and reading your comments certainly give me some things to consider. I am a little confused as where to go from here. We are trying some diet changes. What we noticed so far is the removal of gluten seems to be improving his energy level though now he seems a little more hyper than normal as well. Dairy had been previously removed due to a possible allergy with his brother. Something else we noticed was that in the removal of wheat we were substituting more corn than normal and that seemed to have a negative effect on him as well. I am considering the ALCAT test..what are your thoughts on that test? Is there one better? We have natural calm, though I am unsure of the dosage. We are currently giving him 1 teaspoon per day in two doses. I am looking for a multivitamin and had heard good things about Kirkman Spectrum Complete but they are reformulating and said it wouldn't be available for atleast 4 weeks. Is there another comparable vitamin? And lastly what type of dr should we be looking to see? I live near San Diego and there seems to be lots of holistic and alternative doctors in the area. I should also say we did see a neurologist who said his chances of developing TS were just under fifty percent, though there was no reason to continue to see him unless we needed to medicate in the future. I know this was very long, thank you for taking the time to read. I look forward to continuing to follow this forum :-)

[Ozimum]

Hi! Welcome!

 

A quick response...Some of those symptoms suggest food sensitivities to me (but I might be wrong!) I come from the Biomed approach and, if I were you, I'd be checking out the following for eg.

- phenols (asthma problems, dark circles under eyes among other symptoms),

- glutamate (asthma, etc),

- dairy, wheat, chocolate, corn, soy (dark circle under eyes among many symptoms, particularly if accompanied by ear aches, coughing, etc)

 

It really depends on the overall symptoms as to exactly what is going on.

 

Personally I like the Biomed/DAN! practitioners (you don't have to have a child on the spectrum), but a good Naturopath, Homeopath or possibly a Dietician should be able to help. Like all things, shop around.

Good luck!

Edited April 11, 2011 by Ozimum

[Chemar]

Hi and welcome

 

in addition to food allergies, I would also suggest looking into environmental factors that may be causing all this

 

have you had mold testing done in your house?

 

any new woodwork, paint, carpeting?

 

pesticides? or other chemicals?

 

new pet?

 

Also, has your child had strep infection? Do you live in a Lyme Disease area?

 

re the TS, I personally feel TS is genetically inherited and so if there is a family history of TS or tics, then yes I agree with the neuro but if not, I think you are looking at tics being triggered by another source

[Cj60]

We are currently giving him 1 teaspoon per day in two doses. I am looking for a multivitamin and had heard good things about Kirkman Spectrum Complete but they are reformulating and said it wouldn't be available for atleast 4 weeks.

 

Wow! Thanks for the news concerning the KSC!

I just went to order some, since it's a key supplement for us. I got an email reply that I'm not used to getting concering backorder delivery dates. When I called I was told that, indeed, the hypoallergenic (nonflavored) form is gone and not be be back until they get one of the ingredients (glucosamine sulfate) to meet standards, as it had before. Otherwise I guess they'll reformulate? I'm keeping my fingers crossed that that they do indeed get that ingredient to meet the standard.

 

In the meantime, I ordered the flavored version. It has all the things the hypoallergenic version had, plus: natural piña colada flavor, stevia leaf extract, mannitol, starch.

 

We won't run out of the non-flavored for a couple of weeks. At that point, it will be hold breath, cross fingers, and watch watch watch...

 

 

With regard to the magnesium, our son (9) gets 1 tsp in the pm, but there's there's also some mg in the multi. I add a pinch on top of his multi in the morning, so he's probably getting close to 2 tsp daily.

 

Good luck, and thanks for that infor re the multi,

 

Chris

[wesimkins]

Thanks for the responses. I did locate a few naturopathic doctors in the area. Many are very familiar with allergies but none with tics. I also found a DAN doctor just down the road from us. Dr Kevin Moeller. He is also on the list of those doctors that treat Lyme disease (this is interesting & scary as our vet wants to treat our dog for lyme because of joint pain, lethargy and loss of appetite?) This comes with a price tag of $400.00 a visit and he does not accept insurance and we have an HMO so it probably wouldn't matter anyway. Do you think that sounds right? and worth the cost? (of course if it helps our son get better any amount would be worth it).

 

Thanks again ;-)

[Dalit]

Welcome. We've been on the forum for three years now. Thanks to the shared knowledge here we've kept our daughter off medications, and her condition improved tremendously. She started ticcing at age 7, very abruptly, with the mouth stretches you're describing your son has. In the begining she was ticcing numerous times a minute, and it was very stressful on her body and mind.

We tried accupuncture first, and she still sees an accupuncturist every couple of weeks. i feel that this treatment (which may be much less expensive) has done a lot of good for her (in reducing tics, but not eliminating them). Her accupuncturist also practices NAET, which can be used to diagnose allergies or sensitivities (some say can cure them as well). This is helpful in deciding what to eliminate from the diet. By the way, my daughter had childhood asthma (cured at age 4 - accupuncture and NAET), and has those dark circles under her eyes, too.

We found that eliminating gluten is very helpful. If corn has an adverse effect, try almond flour instead. it's easy to bake with and very healthy. There is a company in Southern California called Honeyville that specializes in that, and it will cost you much less than in whole foods. (it does come in large quantities - you can just freeze part of it, and it will be fine).

 

The whole alternative medicine journey does tend to get very expensive. We've tried homeopathy (very expensive and didn't help our daughter), as well as the TMJ connection (may be helping, we're still on the fence about that). Your son is 7 and just started ticcing, so it may very well be a transient tic disorder. You can start with the simple things - magnesium, good vitamins, eliminating foods, and give it a few months, before you turn to the very expensive practitioners.

 

Good luck.