About Mark Winburn

I’m Mark Winburn and I’m a Tourette’s sufferer. [Hi, Mark!] My father has a bit of it, hardly noticeable, as do my two girls and it’s entirely possible my son will, too, although he’s a bit young to know just yet - statistically speaking - since onset usually isn’t until around age 12.

Mine started in elementary school. My first memory of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder was when I would walk in the house after school and count all my right turns and left turns inside the house and then turn around and around in whatever order necessary to “even things out.” This counting, while clearly OCD, nevertheless helped me in school as it wasn’t until OCD and TS kicked in that I started to excel in math and quickly started outdoing my teachers.

Before I was nine I started to blink a lot. Nothing really annoying but the frequency made me a bit odd, sort of the bizarro image of General Wesley Clark who, as a West Point undergraduate blinked too much and literally taught himself not to blink, which, anecdotally, very much worked against his presidential run. (Was it the Tourette’s?) About that same time I took up the violin and I noticed even then that my Tourette’s went away when I played and that freedom (joy?) helped me practice for hours on end and when I was 12 I was concertmaster for the Los Angeles Youth Symphony. I also played all kinds of sports as a kid (still do) but from the time I was 10 until I was 12 I led the American Youth Soccer Organization (AYSO) in scoring. I was quicker than anyone (focused twitching?) and had a greater field sense than anyone (counting? OCD?) and ultimately worked harder than anyone because, like the violin, the TS was gone and there was a sense of comfort, joy. All my successes in youth I attribute to Tourette Syndrome. One way or another the disorder made me better. And keeping a sense of humor about it actually made me popular. So, what’s so bad about Tourette’s?

Well, I wasn’t formally diagnosed until my late 20’s. I had been a good athlete, student, employee, and my fiction writing was really coming along. I was living with my fiancee at the time and two things happened: 1) my writing schedule was to work from 8-12 every weekend morning during which time I’d be in my home office twitching and grunting away. One day she closed the door because the noise was just too much for her to bear. Ultimately, we didn’t marry but I knew I had to do something or I was going to be a pebble in her Manolos forever. 2) I put off a visit to the neurologist for a long time because of a curious incident that you can see, in kind, by watching the movie Awakenings. At one point, for no particular reason or for precisely the right reason, when I was twitching after work on day, my fiancee hugged me and after only about a minute the twitches went away completely … for the night. At that point I completely understood transference and the indomitable power of unconditional love. No different from the joy I felt while playing the violin, the joy - and something much greater - took away the Tourette’s. It wasn’t the focus that took it away like playing the violin or keeping track of players on the soccer field, it was much greater. In the movie Awakenings, there’s a moment when Robert De Niro’s character is twitching away horribly and he’s saying goodbye to the love of his life played by Penelope Ann Miller. As De Niro gets up to leave, she grabs him by the hand, and in what is a half-dance, half-hug, they hold each other and the twitching dissolves completely. It’s touching. It’s perfect. And it’s true.

And since starting on medication I’ve had an extremely hard time writing fiction.

Today I take Klonopin (Clonazepam) and almost no one would know I had any bit of Tourette Syndrome. It was after college and in my first job - as stress began to climb - that twitches and outbursts became a real distraction and “loading up on my twitches” became a daily event that could only burst out in my car for about 15 minutes before I headed home. I had to do something and while Klonopin is said to be more addictive than Valium or even heroin, I wouldn’t give it up. One time I tried. Under the guidance of a neurologist I came off Klonopin over a nine-week period and switched to Prozac, which was meant to have the same controlling effect but without the addictive or withdrawal qualities. Well, Prozac sucks. And so does its kin. At least for me. And so I take my 3mg/day of Klonopin and move on.

I started searching the Web some time ago and through various means discovered that there are a lot of people out there talking about Tourette Syndrome - some wisely and humanely, some stupidly. My aim here it to present as much information as I can find and, being the opinionated person I am, point out what is worth thinking about or commenting on. Along the way I hope to learn more, too. After all, I’ve got three kids and they come first. And who knows? Maybe my fiction writing will come back, too.

If you feel hazardous enough to contact me directly write to markwinburn {at} gmail {dot} com (sorry for not having a direct link but I get massive amounts of spam just like the rest of you).