What it's like to have Tourette's — and how music gives me back control | Esha Alwani

114,279 views ・ 2019-04-23

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I'd like you to imagine what it would feel like
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if, for two whole minutes, your left arm was continuously flapping,
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your eyes were constantly rolling,
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your jaw was clenching so hard
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that it felt like your teeth were about to break,
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and every ten seconds,
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you were forced to let out a loud, high-pitched screech.
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(Tic)
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This is how I lived at the young age of six,
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every waking moment, seven days a week.
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(Tic)
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And these were only some of my symptoms.
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When these symptoms surfaced, my life literally changed overnight.
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I could no longer go to school, see my friends or even eat out,
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because my tics would attract the attention of everyone in the room.
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In search for a cure, we flew to New York
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to meet with the best pediatric neuropsychologist my parents could find.
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(Tic)
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But the doctor did not give us the easy remedy we had hoped for.
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Instead, she diagnosed me with an incurable neurological disorder,
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Tourette syndrome.
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Oftentimes, medication can be an essential and valuable part
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of many treatment processes.
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But in my case, the drugs only made things worse.
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One drug put me in a wheelchair,
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because my legs had gotten so numb that I couldn't move them.
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Another one caused me to hallucinate.
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I would see green people running after me,
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threatening to boil me in a pot and drink me as soup.
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And it was really scary.
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We tried drug after drug
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to find something that would bring me some sort of relief.
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But every single attempt just ended up making things worse.
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It is estimated that in 2013 in the United States alone,
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the prescription drug expenditure
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to treat neurological conditions and mental illness
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was about 89 billion dollars annually.
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But imagine if there were a way to treat these conditions
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without a price or without side effects.
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Imagine if your doctor prescribed you a daily dose of music.
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I'm here today to share with you my personal experience with music
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and the effect that it had on my neurological disorder.
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(Tic)
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Tourette syndrome is essentially a series
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of involuntary movements and sounds,
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known as tics.
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The best way for me to really describe what it's like to have Tourette syndrome
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is something I'm sure you're all very familiar with --
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the hiccups.
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You can try to stop yourself from the act.
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You can hold your breath and count to 10, or drink water upside down,
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but there is just nothing you can do about it
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until the sensation passes and the hiccups have taken their course.
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I often lay on my bedroom floor after an attack of tics,
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feeling exhausted and in despair.
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(Tic)
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My equally desperate mother would attempt to soothe me and herself
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by putting on some music.
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She would play peaceful music to soothe our aching hearts.
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And we'd lie together on the floor
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and allow the beat of the drums to uplift us.
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And as the rhythms and the tunes unfolded,
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our spirits would rise, our moods would be lighter,
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and we would be rejuvenated.
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(Tic)
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Very soon, and rather unknowingly, I became an addict of this newfound drug.
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When I found myself slipping into my bouts of sadness and self-pity,
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I would rush to the 88 keys of my piano,
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knowing in my heart that the tones and rhythms from each one of those keys
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would soon set me free.
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At the time, I didn't realize how much music was helping me.
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It was just something I did by default.
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When I wrote my songs, it wasn't to impress anybody.
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It was just a release.
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But the more I played, the less my symptoms surfaced,
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and the intensity of my attacks reduced.
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So I became curious as to how these songs were soothing my symptoms.
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And I wondered if there were any other cases of medicinal music.
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So I began to search.
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I found that there was a highly successful US congresswoman,
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Gabby Giffords, who was shot in the head.
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She lost her ability to speak.
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Because the ability to speak and the ability to sing
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lay in two separate parts of the brain,
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her doctors brought in music therapists to work with her.
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The therapists encouraged her to sing her thoughts,
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since she was incapable of speaking them.
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And through this technique,
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the congresswoman was finally able to regain her speech.
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Music helped heal Gabby Giffords.
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Scientists have found that music causes our brains to release a natural painkiller
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known as oxytocin
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and a feel-good chemical, dopamine.
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Dopamine is essential for a healthy nervous system
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and strongly impacts emotional health.
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Music also affects our heart rate, breathing and pulse rate,
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as it stimulates blood flow.
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In addition, it lowers our cortisol levels,
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thus reducing anxiety,
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which is a common stimulant for neurological symptoms.
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In our lifetimes, we are all going to know someone with a neurological disorder.
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If it's not a family member --
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(Tic)
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it could be a friend or a coworker.
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Please help me spread this message:
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music has the ability to uplift our lives and heal us from within.
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I still have Tourette syndrome.
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I deal with it every day, every hour.
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I'm going to deal with it for the rest of my life.
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And that means that I have to frequently excuse myself from my classroom,
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because my verbal tics can be extremely distracting.
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That means that sometimes when I wink my eyes involuntarily,
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the guy sitting opposite from me thinks I'm flirting with him,
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when I'm really not.
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(Laughter)
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And I have to tell him, "Sorry -- I wasn't trying to flirt."
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But the most amazing thing is
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that when I sing, play music and even just listen to music,
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I don't tic.
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I've been onstage numerous times in highly stressful situations,
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with thousands of people watching me.
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And while I do tic before my performance --
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(Tic)
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when the music starts, the tics take a back seat.
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So I may have written my own lyrics and composed my own music.
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But in reality, I've realized it was the music that composed me.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)
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(Tic)
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(Music)
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(Singing) I think I took my mask off too soon
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'Cause you were there and then you were not
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I think I pushed it all onto you
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I should have dragged it out dragged it out
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I think that maybe each time I lose a bit of myself I put it back on
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Just to fake it till I break my own heart in two
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And oh I wanted you to know the real me
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And take it seriously
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But now
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I'm not loving you I'm not loving you
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I'm not loving you
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I thought I could trust you
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But you're running away from me and my mask
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I'm not loving you I'm not loving you
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I'm not loving you
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Right now
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I think I took my mask off too soon
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Because you screamed when I pulled it off
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You told me you were unprepared
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And like that just like that
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I think that maybe this time it hurt more than it ever has before
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I think maybe this blow I took was a little more
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A little more
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And oh I wanted you to know the real me
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And take it seriously
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But now
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I’m not loving you I'm not loving you
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I'm not loving you
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I thought I could trust you
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But you're running away from me and my mask
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I'm not loving you I'm not loving you
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I'm not loving you
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Right now
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(Applause)
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