6 year old with tics

[Pam0077]

Hi my ds is 6 yrs old and for the past year he has had recurring tics. This has consisted of shoulder shrugging, eye blinking (very fast), throat clearing. They come and go and his tics vary, such as he may have the eye blinking for a few months then this will stop
and the shoulder tics will start. We have seen a Paediatrician who just said it is transient tics which he will grow out of in time, which wasn’t too helpful given the fact that this has persisted on and off for a year now and he gets very frustrated and uncomfortable. I just wondered if anyone had gone through the same and had any advice? I feel like I’m letting him down by taking the ‘wait and see’ approach as it does bother him.

Hi OP
My 6 year old DS had a bout of tics for 6 weeks at the start of 2020, shortly after his 5th birthday.
They came back with a vengeance at the start of January this year.
They are still going strong. The main one is a noise (cross between a cough/grunt/throat clear/burp...very difficult to describe). He also has some motor ones though these tend to be less pronounced.
I'm not coping well with this at all. In fact, I've become a bit of a wreck emotionally.
I myself have OCD (which is pretty well controlled with sertraline) and I've recently discovered the link between OCD and Tourettes.
What makes your paediatrician think it's definitely transient? I'm not saying he or she is wrong or anything (I have no medical knowledge/expertise!). I'm just curious to know what his/her rationale is.
I have been told by drs to ignore ignore ignore as much as possible. And that's what I'm trying to do.
Sometimes I see that my son's tics do really bother him. And that breaks my heart.
I wish I had some good advice to give you.

Hi Solfege, thanks for your reply it certainly sounds very similar to what we are going through and it’s heartbreaking to watch. The Paediatrician to be honest didn’t seem too interested just saying at his young age and they outgrow these things which was very frustrating. I keep waiting for them to ease off but as one tic stops another starts. The eye blinking is driving him crazy though and it’s hard to watch. There just doesn’t seem much support out there at all.

At their worst, how often will your son tic?
At their worst, my DS's tics will happen every few seconds!

Yes literally the same, he can be blinking so fast continuously and shrugging his shoulders it’s draining to watch him.

They shouldn’t be fobbing you off. Motor and vocal tics that have lasted over a year without a break meet criteria for diagnosis of Tourettes, once other causes such as PANDAS have been ruled out. We were fobbed off for years when a diagnoses could have been made very quickly.

Dd developed tics after her preschool jabs, so around age 4. These were constant repetitive noises like “eh eh eh”, nose twitching, eye rolling and grunting. The only time she didn’t make noises was when she was asleep. It was constant during the day except for when she was at school, where she twitched and eye rolled, but withheld the noises. This went on until she was about 11 and seemed to subside but then came spot picking and snorting (which is very hard to listen to as it so loud and snotty, like a man snort, which doesn’t belong on a young girl).
We’ve never been given a diagnosis. “Probably transient and she’ll grow out of it” was all we got, plus a nasal spray to see if it stopped her grunting, in case it was post nasal drip. It had no effect.

It sounds as though the transient and growing out of it comments are so common, very frustrating and very little help out there. It’s awful to watch your child feeling agitated and clearly it bothers them. We have been given advice recently to try antihistamines in case it is hayfever, which we know it isn’t.

There is a lot of misinformation out there. Transient tics would be diagnosed if the child has only motor tics or vocal tics for over a year. If they have both motor and vocal tics they don’t meet criteria for transient tics and should be assessed for a diagnosis of Tourette’s after other causes have been ruled out e.g PANDAS or medication causing tics.

Thank you, I think we will need to head back to the Paediatrician to mention some of this and get past the ‘wait and see’ advice! x