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What It’s Like Working in an Office When You Have Tourette’s Syndrome
And how working from home set me free.
I don’t always like to talk about my Tourette’s these days. It’s much milder than it used to be, and I guess I feel guilty. I never want to take space away from others who have more of a story to tell. I’m trying to remind myself, though, that mild as it may be now, it’s part of who I am, which means it’s my story, too.
The whole “9 to 5” type experience has always been hard for me. In school, I struggled immensely. My Tourette’s first came onto the scene when I was in third grade, and a teacher called my mom and told her that I was doing strange things with my body and the other kids were going to think I was weird, so could she please get me to stop. I hadn’t been diagnosed yet, so my mom didn’t have an explanation to present to the teacher. So instead, she asked me about it.
“Catie, why are you doing that with your body?”
“Because it feels good, mommy!”
“Well, do you think you can wait until after school or when you’re alone to feel good?”
“But … I don’t know when I’m going to need to feel good.”
And that was that. My mom told the teacher I couldn’t stop, and she wasn’t apologetic about it. My mom was never…
