See the child before the syndrome, because she’s not a joke, she’s a person, and she’s perfect the way she is. At seventeen, she joked with a friend about a hot-dog breakfast and morning nausea, then spent lunch break in a school bathroom staring at a test that turned her world. It was positive in every sense. A few months after her eighteenth birthday, in Grande Prairie, she held her daughter, Tanner, and told herself to live one day at a time. Those days carried them from one small town to another, then to Edmonton, and finally to Spruce Grove. A little sister joined the family. Tanner grew like a firework, an early walker, an early talker, always ahead of the growth charts, blue as her favorite color, devoted to Hello Kitty and Mickey Mouse, and planning to be an astronaut farmer on the moon. She loved reading and the thrill of learning, flipping pages, and tossing out facts like candy.
The first sign was tiny: a soft throat sound, a click you could miss if you didn’t know her. Her parents noticed, then her grandpa, then a few others. The family doctor wasn’t worried. He said her brain might be burning off extra energy, suggesting gentle redirection and maybe starting school early. They chose a small private school, and Tanner bloomed—top grades, sports, and real friends. The sound faded so much they forgot about it until a teacher, years later, asked if they knew she sometimes made a low, guttural noise when she wasn’t busy. They shrugged; it came and went. By twelve, she moved to a public school for more opportunities. For a while, everything held. Then it didn’t.
By fall 2020, the strain of a new school, higher expectations, unkind kids, and a global pandemic wore her thin. Sleep slipped. Tears and anger replaced calm. She agreed to see a counselor with a therapy dog and felt hopeful for the first time in months. Then, on a quiet Sunday drive, the car hit black ice and slid into a median. Everyone walked away sore but safe, or so they thought.
The next morning, Tanner woke up with tics that roared: whistles, stutters, clicks, eye squeezes, nostril flares, head jerks, lip pops, raspberries, arm spasms. They stacked one on another, painful and relentless. In the ER, test after test ruled out infections. A doctor called it a “stress fracture,” but for the mind, and sent them to a pediatric specialist who confirmed it: the tics were tied to stress and emotion. Anxiety medication might help her nerves, not the tics. Therapy would teach coping. So they built routines, sleep, quiet time, and slow mornings.
Going back to school was rough. On day one, a teacher asked the “whistler” to stop, and Tanner came home in tears. They learned new words: masking, complex and straightforward tics, and comorbidities. Her therapist diagnosed generalized anxiety disorder. The specialist raised Tourette syndrome as a possibility but explained there’s no official diagnosis until both motor and vocal tics persist for a year. Tanner chose to try life without medication for as long as she could, to learn how to manage her body on her own terms. Some days, she dragged herself through the door and burst into tears.
Some kids knew they could trigger her with certain sounds and thought it was funny. They didn’t understand the cost, how much energy it takes to fight a body that won’t listen, how much shame rides behind every twitch. Her family built supports: new seating when needed, code words, “mental health mornings” after hard days, careful sleep schedules, extra patience from bus drivers and teachers.
A year passed. The specialist was on maternity leave, and a new doctor pushed meds Tanner didn’t want. When Tanner asked for the formal diagnosis she’d waited 365 days for, the doctor said, almost flatly, “You have motor and vocal tics, and it’s been longer than a year. Congratulations, you have Tourette’s. It doesn’t change anything.” Tanner crumpled, and her mother decided no one would ever minimize her again. They turned to education. Her mom read everything she could and wrestled with guilt about genetics, she has OCD, until Tanner reminded her that none of this was her fault. Together, they began answering the same questions people always have. Most folks only know the TV version of Tourette’s, the rare coprolalia that affects a small minority.
In real life, tics vary wildly from person to person, can be vocal or motor, complex or straightforward, and don’t touch intelligence. What they do touch is energy and dignity; imagine flexing your muscles for hours without rest and trying to pretend you’re fine. That’s the fight. Tanner refused to be reduced to a symptom. She kept drawing, joking, playing music, and teaching herself two languages. She volunteered three days a week and decided she wants to foster kids someday. She’s already an advocate, gently correcting relatives’ assumptions and helping people learn how to meet invisible disabilities with respect.
Her family keeps talking to teachers, classmates, and anyone who will listen, because the only way to change what people joke about is to change what people understand. She is not a punchline or a cautionary tale. She’s a teenager with a whole life, hurts and wins, art and laughter, tough mornings and brave afternoons. The tics are part of her story, not the title.
