Navigating Tourette's: A Father-Son Journey

In this inspiring episode, I sit down with Dr. Jeff Lichtman and his son, Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD, for an intimate conversation about parenting a child with Tourette syndrome. Jeff, a renowned psychologist and visionary leader in special education, shares his personal journey of coming to terms with Jeremy's diagnosis and the challenges they faced as a family. Jeremy, now a successful psychologist himself, reflects on growing up with Tourette's and how his parents' unwavering support and advocacy shaped his life. Together, they offer invaluable insights and advice for parents navigating the ups and downs of raising a child with special needs.

Dr. Jeff Lichtman, Director of Student Mental Health Services and Professor at Touro University, is known for his 30 years of visionary leadership at Yachad, the National Jewish Council for Disabilities, and founding the IVDU Schools. As a psychologist, his expertise includes counseling, leadership, social skills development, and teacher training.

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD, licensed psychologist and director at Central Therapy, specializes in treating youth and adults with emotional dysregulation, PTSD, Tourette syndrome, anxiety disorders, OCD, and trichotillomania. Certified in CBIT and MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD, he provides individual counseling, facilitates groups, and presents workshops for NJCTS.

Episode Highlights:

[2:24] Jeremy's earliest memories of his tics and getting diagnosed with Tourette's.

[6:32] Jeff's perspective as a father seeing his son going through this in middle and high school.

[10:25] The challenges Jeremy faced in school due to his ADHD and hyperactivity.

[15:21] How Jeremy used humor as a powerful tool to educate people about his Tourette's.

[19:16] The shift in focus from social concerns to academic performance in high school.

[24:35] Balancing the needs of siblings when one child requires more specialized support.

[33:44] Jeremy's adult support group for parents of children with Tourette's through NJCTS.

[37:03] Jeremy's appreciation for his parents' support and the importance of utilizing available resources.

[38:46] Jeff's closing advice for parents: have faith in your child's resilience.

Links & Resources:

Jeremy's website - https://www.centraltherapynj.com/

Jeremy's NJCTS parent support group: https://njcts.org/event/todays-challenge-tomorrows-strength-a-support-group-for-parents-of-children-with-tourette-or-tic-disorders-2/?event_date=2024-06-12

Remember, each story shared on this podcast brings light and understanding to the diverse experiences within the Tourette's community. Your journey is your own, and it's filled with potential and promise. If this episode resonated with you, I encourage you to like, share, and leave a review to help us connect with more listeners.

Transcript

Jeff Lichtman: 0:00

And he used sure a lot of interesting humor is a very powerful tool. It was the tool that he chose completely on his own. As soon as way of educating people and letting them know, you know that he had Tourette Syndrome, but he was Jeremy because I'm

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 0:13

not a very funny person and it gave me the excuse to pretend to be funny because no one's gonna be like, your jokes aren't funny, dude.

Michael Leopold: 0:21

Welcome to the apptech brought to you by The New Jersey Center for Tourette syndrome and associated disorders, empowering children and adults through education, advocacy and research by sharing the stories and experiences relevant to the TS community. Hello, before we dive into this episode, I have a quick update about scheduling. You may have noticed we did not post an episode last week. This is because I was out presenting it TIG con the trade association of America's annual TS conference. We are now resuming our regular cadence starting today with new episodes airing every other Tuesday. So without further ado, here's the latest episode. Welcome back to the apptech This episode is about parenting children with Ts. I'm speaking with two people today. The first you may recognize from a season one episode we had with him on seebut it's Jeremy Lichtman, a clinical psychologist and CBT expert known to many of us in the JCHS family. He's the director and founder at Central therapy and the director of the caps trading practicum at the Graduate School of Applied Professional Psychology at Rutgers University. And because this is an episode about parenting, Jeremy's father Jeff is also joining us. Jeff Lichtman is also a clinical psychologist and he has 30 years of experience in the field. He is the director of student mental health services and Lucile Wiedemann, Director and Professor of graduate Jewish education and special education at Touro. University, and also the international Director Emeritus of UConn, the National Jewish Council for disabilities. Thank you both so much for being here today.

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 2:05

Yeah, thank you for having us. Jeremy, you've

Michael Leopold: 2:07

helped countless TS patients in NJ CTS and beyond. So I want to kick off our discussion with something we may be less familiar with, which is your childhood story growing up with Tech's Jeremy, would you mind walk us through those earliest years with when your tics started and how you got diagnosed?

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 2:24

I don't really remember. Mostly because, well, one, I don't have like any memories from before, like fifth grade. But also, in addition to my father, being a psychologist, my mother is as well. And she caught my tics pretty early on and correct me if I'm wrong, Abba, I'll be the Hebrew for dad or father. So you you you're about a lot. So just giving everyone that knowledge. I'm pretty sure she caught it when I was about two years old. Or those are pretty oblivious kid, I was at each dealer hyperactive. And like I was I think my if I see my father now like I was a pretty oblivious kid. So I don't know what I had a huge impact on me when I was really younger. Other than like, once or twice a year, though, we were driving up to Dr. King in Yale University at the Child Study Center there. I just remember kind of being on medication from a pretty early age. And I think really around like middle school is lived maybe a little bit before with prayer services or the way it really started to stand out to me that like you're supposed to stand in this room, 45 minutes to an hour and a half, depending on what the prayers, services and mostly supposed to be quiet and having vocal tics in sixth grade is when I wasn't just with my grade, but I was with the seventh and eighth graders as well. And so those were people who didn't know me and didn't necessarily know I had texts. And so I think that's where it really started to stand out to me like, oh, that's early. I personally remember really kind of thinking about like, Are people noticing me I see people looking at me, I hear people whispering math right around puberty time. So that's when most people with Tourette's knows they really when you have that kind of increase in Tourette syndrome and the tics, the frequency, and intensity of them. I know I didn't go to sleepaway camp the first summer I was supposed to I think after sixth grade because of my texts, but I did go the following year and that was a totally new environment. I didn't know anyone known for my grade went to the camp I went to for for my school, though, that you really formative experience for me, because growing up talking about tics and something I can talk a lot about with in the parent group I run for NJ CTS. I think one of the biggest things my family gave me or my parents gave me around this was language to talk about it at a young age. And it was something that we could talk about, right? It wasn't taboo. It wasn't ignored, but it wasn't everything. So I have the language to be able to talk about it. And so when people would start asking me in camp, especially about this, I had the language to talk about it. And people were really great. And people were really understanding. And I remember like oversharing a little bit like a mini celebrity at camp like if people wanted to know what it was because of this. And it was really good to be there. I had the language from growing up. And now I was using it in a way that I never really had to because I'm sure my dad can talk more about this later. But so much of growing up I knew Now as an adult have he shaped my environment. So the people who needed to know knew, but definitely there were like, they actually did things to shape the environment in there too. And I'll let him talk about that. But that was the first time where I was really surrounded by a lot of kids who I didn't know. And I was talking to myself about it. And that was a really meaningful experience to meet to be able to talk about it. At some point in high school, I decided to sort of make it the kind of thing that I would joke about, right, that was my way to talk about it in my way, just introduce myself, even to new people going to new places, is carried on for years. So much so that I have an adult this is probably about I don't know, eight, nine years ago, I was meeting one of my wife's high school friends for the first time and she went to the bathroom. And I was just being silly and making noises. I was like, Oh, don't worry about it. I have Tourette syndrome. And they weren't tics. But it's just like my way to introduce it to this new person. And her friend goes, That's horrible. How can you make fun of people with Tourette's like that? How could you do that? And they're like, no, like, I actually have this is real. And she's like, I don't believe, like, if you were to ask me, my wife when she comes out, and she comes out, and she goes, does he have Tourette Syndrome? My wife looks her dead in the eye goes, no, yes, he does. But that was the most important thing was the language to talk about it, I would have lots of talks as my dad about growing up, especially in high school, the common thing my dad would be into the office in the home working and like I just kind of pop in and sit on the floor. And we talked for half an hour or two hours, however long, that's something I did something my sisters did. And that was definitely a topic of conversation, among many others.

Michael Leopold: 6:32

Jeff would love to get your thoughts on this when Jeremy was in middle school in high school. What was this, like, from your perspective, being the father and parent is seeing your kid going through this?

Jeff Lichtman: 6:41

So you mean, now you want the true story of The Good, the Bad, the Ugly? No, actually, I'm joking, not the true story. But there are multiple stories. In other words, we all see things from different perspectives, and experience them from different perspectives. It could be the same story but from different angles. With your permission, I'm gonna go back I'm going to parallel Jeremy just go back a little bit earlier. In spite the fact Jeremy was about to my wife held notice that he had tics was suspecting that maybe he had Tourette's and and I didn't want to hear about it. And by the way, here I am. I'm a psychologist. I'm also at that time running an organization for people with disabilities and an organization that that promoting inclusion in the work community. But I didn't want to hear that my son had something anything. What did he have? She was persistent. And while I was uncomfortable, nevertheless, I agreed and we went to the Yale Child Study Center that Jeremy referenced, which was and is one of the best child study centers in the country. And important in fact, got the diagnosis of Tourette Syndrome. At that point, it was more difficult for me than for my wife. And actually, for the next several years, I actually threw myself into doing work with same NJ CTS. It was really just a relatively starting organization and had started not long before that it was nice to direct groups for them. I did counseling for individuals, and both kids and adults. Fortunately, I had some professional backgrounds, if you will, to be able to do that. But it was really to be very candid. My catharsis, it was my way of coming to terms with Jeremy having Tourette's. Hopefully, I helped other people, but it was certainly helpful to me. Later on. As things develop, Lee, Jeremy referenced, shaping the environment, we very much worked hard to shake the environment. On the weekends, we worked hard to make sure that our house was the house to be for the kid, you know, like this is the house behind data. And it was when I made sure we what the best candy, the most variety of candy, I mean, the death of me, I'm going to jump in and just say that this is something that for kids, I work with Tourette syndrome or other diagnoses where social potential social stigmatization, or actual social segmentation is going on. This is advice that I continue to give to this day, to families that I work with, but sorry, I cut you off. But I needed good advice. And I, I think it's one of the best things that we did, frankly, in terms of helping to shape the environment. So in other words, we created an environment where while the kids were hanging out here, and it was a safe environment for Jeremy, I was an environment that we could monitor that I could monitor and I spent a lot of time I would hang out with the kids look, Jeremy was a voice and we would play games together and stuff like that. So it helped me to do it myself as a parent to develop some rapport and relationships with his friends with his peers, as well as seeing the situation and being able to monitor. So that was one big thing. I think that we did and I think it was very effective. Jerry mentioned that he called morbid with his Tourette's he has ADHD when he was younger, it did manifest with hyperactivity in particular school the first couple years preschool and early grades were really challenging. I would come into school and teachers would complain, if you will about Jeremy's behavior. And I spent a lot of time setting up behavior plans were for the teachers to use with Jeremy. So My professional background at that point was helpful. He's not mentioning

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 10:21

also becoming president of the Board of Education at the school, if anyone wanted to do anything, they're also talking to the president of the Board of Education at the school.

Jeff Lichtman: 10:31

That is true, but that I would have done anyways. And I wasn't yet I wasn't the head of I was a member of the Board of Education at that point. What's the expression you got to pay to play in a certain sense, my involvement in the school and providing support to the school in any of a number of ways professionally and otherwise, made me a resource to the school a value added parents to the school. So if Jeremy was, you know, it was more leeway. I think by the time he got to middle school, the ADHD in school behavior really was a non issue. He continued to have Tourette's, but his behavior was fine. And he actually I think, at that point, had a reputation, if you will, with the teachers and the school faculty, as a nice kid will be a nice kid didn't stand out, really very milquetoast low key, etc. Nice voice didn't say that in any particular with any ethics. And, okay, you know, they dealt with it and they weren't listening. I would say his picks were moderate. They weren't severe. They weren't mild. They weren't severe. It was fine. And he had a good good relationships with his friends. He mentioned go to camp when he went to camp. So again, we volunteered now his older sister was already in gap. And so we had a real a little bit of a relationship with again, but I volunteered, myself and my wife every year, the camp would have a psychologist to to come up and do training for a weekend of will the camp counselors. I volunteered the summer before he came. And my wife and I did all the training. It's interesting hearing Jeremy reference, oh, it's kind of like they like they knew some of the words already, even though they hadn't had kids with Tourette. As best as I know, before that, well, that's because we gave them the word. And so even though we were talking about as counselors working with kids in general and managing behavior in the bunk and outside of the bucket like that, we also took the opportunity to mention the Jeremy was going to be coming to camp vignette Tourette syndrome. And what does that mean and respond to all these things. It

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 12:36

was a big revelation to me as an adult to when my parents are filling me in on this stuff, like, oh, that's why we went up that weekend, and I was able to get familiar with the camp like, Oh, so you could talk about trips and you're into all of the staff. I had no idea I was not. I was in my own world as a kid being

Jeff Lichtman: 12:54

there for that weekend besides what we could do, and meant that before all the other kids were there, Jeremy was seen and got to know some of the staff etcetera, so that, you know, slink cap actually started when he was a known commodity, there wasn't this scary kind of thing. Look, we made a lot of progress. I think that while they still locked his ignorance about Tourette Syndrome today, there was so much more ignorance. In those days, it really wasn't known. And if it was known, it's interesting. If it was known, it was primarily known for the echolalia component that some kids have, ironically, corporate laelia started quarterly. Exactly. So and while only 5% of the Tourette Syndrome population habit.

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 13:38

A little more about the research, I don't know about the research that my dad is now, let's

Jeff Lichtman: 13:42

agree five to 10%. Regardless, with that, if it was known at all, it was known for that, actually. So quick sidebar, what you didn't know it's interesting. I think the reason why it was known that way that would because and here's where media can play a positive or negative function. It was a show on TV back in those days called I think, la law. This was also the days I know, I'm really dating myself. This was before streaming before you had 4000 channels, and you watch from your computer, everybody watching the TV still, and it was there were a limited number of channels. Anyways, there were a couple of episodes where they had a client who was arrested and was being fried. And it was in relation to his corporate lenalee. Right. In other words, he'd used foul language in some setting. I don't remember the details. But what I do know is that millions of people in America who watched la law, this was really their introduction to Tourette's it is. The takeaway, of course was, oh, people with Tourette Syndrome are people who have the people who who curse, right. I mean, that's what it boils down to. In any event, they had a good camp experience, because Jeremy said by the time he was in later, middle school, early high school, two things happen. One was he was comfortable. really comfortable in speaking for himself, I'll use the term advocating for himself. I don't think he perceived it in that way. But it was. And he used humor a lot. It was interesting humor is a very powerful tool. It was the tool that he chose completely on his own as his way of educating people and letting them know, you know that he had Tourette Syndrome. But he was Jeremy because I'm

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 15:21

not a very funny person. And they gave me the excuse to pretend to be funny, because no one's gonna be like, your jokes aren't funny, dude. So you know, that's one

Jeff Lichtman: 15:29

thing. The other thing that happened was, he didn't want to be on medication anymore. He's been on medication. And and this was one of those times, it's interesting. My wife, Helen would really want it in stem on the medication. She was concerned that maybe the tics would get worse, that maybe it was doing something I do, I'm not sure that it was doing anything he articulated, that it made him feel not himself, when he was on the medication, that it sort of doubled Doulton, if you will, and he wanted to be off the medication. And so at that point, they think it's fair to say that I really stepped up and, and pushed my wife's and he came off the medication. She wasn't happy about it. But

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 16:11

I recall it also had like, I just stopped taking it like I also like cold turkey that what you're not supposed to do on the atypical antipsychotic that I was on at the time, something big there was like I remember in eighth grade for my word report, I got the word lassitude weariness of body and mind. Because throughout middle high school, or my first year of high school, I go to class and put my head down, I take a nap, the bell would ring I'd wake up, I go to my next class. And it was a medication and like, I remember, we were on a break, when I stopped my medication. I think in 10th grade, I came back to school, I went to class, I put my head down, and I didn't fall asleep. That was a big thing. For me. I think something that's also important to talk about that changed in high school, ABA, you'll be able to talk more about this. But I think this is relevant in terms of my journey. And my parents journey around me having Tourette's Syndrome is academically, my parents really didn't push me very hard in elementary and middle school. My dad mentioned me so being like very, like average milk toast not standing out. And I think that's true academically. And I remember growing up not thinking of myself as particularly academically strong, right? It wasn't something that I thought was a strength of mine. And then switching over to high school, all of a sudden, my parents, my mom more, in some ways, my dad to think my dad was happy to let my mom take the lead here was now I also like, I had to do my homework. And it was important, and my grades were important, which was a big shift for me. And I know now having spoken to my parents, both of them about this, that they're at the point where one grades mattered more in high school, but to where I think they'd seen in my mom talks about my achievement testing in my blood IQ testing, even though I was having because of accommodations, I got my scores going up significantly at around middle school in middle school. And now and I think the tie to growing up, my parents are really worried about me socially. And I think they and maybe I'm putting words in your mouth, but but like, I don't know that they had high aspirations for me academically, that you're looking at the research on, especially Tourette syndrome and each together like that's not It's not crazy. And so I imagined that a little bit like they were it's not that they didn't think I could do anything, but I think the stronger focus on on on socializing, right, what took priority for them. But then when high school came along, and they had scored very high on these different achievement tests, I think that was a switch kind of turn for them. Then it felt to me as growing up very sudden, I didn't care about school. Again, I think of myself as someone who's academically strong, that became this big priority all of a sudden, and I think was a big source of tension. For me growing up with my parents by high school. Like I just want to go and play video games all day and hang out with friends and like all of a sudden, I was supposed to do work.

Jeff Lichtman: 18:47

I don't remember doing that middle

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 18:49

school, seeing from my mom and I think my dad's they was doing academically well in middle school and I had scored high like I could do well academically. This is where like you can be the best parents with the best degrees and everything. And it's still hard and there's no perfection here. My parents saw that as academically capable but I didn't believe about myself. And I had a teacher in junior of high school was that really shifted to me and then my parents very much were on board with helping promote that. So

Michael Leopold: 19:17

I know German you mentioned that a couple of sisters. A few topics here. One did did any of your tics involve your siblings in any way and how did your family

Jeff Lichtman: 19:25

handle that?

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 19:26

So I would say very lucky I have two really wonderful sisters. In older sister Daniela and my younger sister and Tina. They were always very supportive of me around this I never really educate super involved them again, this is one of the things that like years later as an adult my younger sister and I talked about how when we would watch TV or apparently have this tick where I'd have like the coke cat or whatever and I like big get your time on the table before I took a drink and she was like she was just a few years ago. She's like it was so annoying, never said anything that really like my sisters were if I ever needed to talk to someone if I He is for phasing had happened like they were there for me and I knew that they were there for me. Maybe we'll have to serve them where we have them on. They could talk about what it was like for them. But maybe I'm I don't know, see you as they ever talked to you about it. And the dirty laundry you want to air here in public for everyone?

Jeff Lichtman: 20:14

No, listen, I think that most of what you've described is in fact the case. It's a tough journey. When he started elementary school, there was the question, should we tell the school that he had that he has Tourette syndrome, and my wife and I really disagreed. I'm the director of a national organization whose mission is to include kids with special needs in the community. So articulate that, to encourage that. Nevertheless, I believe that to tell the schools to tell his teachers that he had Tourette Syndrome, again, in a time when it was so little was known about it would be detrimental to him that they would just have a mindset. That's one thing when you're home, when I can ship this, but I'm not in school every day. So I'm gonna have one conference, I'm going to tell you, you're going to go to whatever your preconceptions misconceptions about Tourette's are. And my wife said, How could you not tell the school, I

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 21:11

was happily switch places with you, you could have gone to school, and I would have stayed home, I would have been happy with that.

Jeff Lichtman: 21:17

Well, I'll make a long story short, we resolved, we agreed that I would I knew the person. And I have a little bit of a relationship principle. And my wife and I agreed that I would speak to the principals and asked her what she wrote. And we would do whatever she suggested. So I went to the principal discussed it with her. And she agreed with me, actually, nobody wants their child to have anything it was always a little bit challenging is always the worry of what's coming ahead. What's the next step. But I think if the parents work together, not necessarily a great tip, I've given you a couple of times where we didn't necessarily agree. But we were able to, notwithstanding that we didn't agree to work together to come to some meaningful resolution, and then work together on whatever that resolution was. So I think he had a supportive family. But it doesn't mean it wasn't challenging his sister, the lifestyle just tell you quickly, as I remember, I imagined that Jeremy remembers this too. But when his oldest sister was graduating from high school, she was in fourth grade, we got to the graduation. This was an all girls high school and the girls had put together a cantata as part of the graduation, like a play with music and everything else. They put this whole thing together, they work for money. And this is right. So we're sitting there while the parents there, hundreds of people, parents, siblings watching and Jeremy starts to tick, and not just body tics, but vocal tics. Exactly. And it was such a dilemma for me, do I take him out, he wants to be there. He wants to see his sister's graduation. I want him to be there. I want to be there. That's on the one hand, and again, I'm going to go back to the same here. I was like trying to be a champion for inclusion. And I'm going to take my kid because he has some kinds of special needs taken out of the mainstream environment. That's on the one hand, on the other hand, while these girls can work hard, and while the families were there, and they want to hear the Qatada and see it and undisturbed Guide to Life, that was very painful. And I took them out. Because they're too to lock in some sort of way. Everybody else's appreciation of the contagious. I think it's important to add, though, like I actually do remember this, and I don't harbor any ill feelings. And I think something that is important. And I talked about this was a family that they work with, right and that for every child with Tourette Syndrome, right, every individual myself one of them, we do exist in a wider environment. And so on the one hand, why don't believe that we should be excluded from any given environment. I also think it's important to recognize when artists can be disruptive to others, right? And once I'm like, I don't want to be invited, because I don't want to have to deal with it. Right. But it's not like there's a simple equation that's just turned out a certain way every time. Right. But I think that is something that's unlike the kind of case by case basis.

Michael Leopold: 24:03

We're talking about siblings, and managing chicks in the family. I'm curious to hear both of your thoughts on this. Patients don't just exist in a vacuum. There's the environment, the people around them, the family, how do parents balance the work when one of their children has more need for more specialized support or attention, they have a diagnosis? How do we support them without making the other siblings that maybe don't have this diagnosis? without them feeling left out? Feeling they're not getting that time? Or that individual attention with their parents? How do we balance that?

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 24:35

So I'm gonna answer first because I'm pretty sure my dad's going to say what I'm going to say. So I wanted to test it. I think something that's important years like I went to grad school for four years, right? I did a two years postdoc like I take the work that I do very seriously. I learned a lot throughout that time. And I would still say a significant portion of how I act as a psychologist and therapist based on my parents and what I look for them growing up. And so I'm about to say isn't not just in evidence being sick. This is hearing my parents talked about this. I think if you asked my dad and I wasn't here, the first thing you would say is like, isn't fair, every kid is different, it's not going to be fair. And so while it might not be fair that and I definitely got a lot more attention than Oh, I would say it's a lot. But I got more attention than my siblings, I think especially early on when my parents were more concerned about my texts. And I think that they did a lot to really, again, as my dad said, shape this environment for myself. For me, when I talked to parents about that I talked about things while they talked about like, yes, it is not necessarily fair that your child was text might need more attention from you and might get more support from you at times. Now, it's, it is critical that as a parent, you do give your time and attention to your other kids as well, you cannot ignore that is they are still your children. But you might need to give more attention to your child with whatever the special needs might be. Even if it's stretching your MIDI, HD autism Down syndrome, anxiety, depression, right? It's also not fair that child is when you have whatever the diagnosis is, whatever the challenges are, right. And so I think, when I talked about assemblies, as I talked about one, it is going to be unfair. And that's okay. Different kids have different needs, right? And parenting is about parenting to the best of your ability to each individual child's needs, right. And even if it means an unequal amount of time and energy put into each child. I think the other thing though, and I talked about with parents of you have to also be able to talk about that with your other kids. I don't think again, I talked a lot earlier about how like having my Tourette's was just a senior we didn't talk about so I don't know exactly what my parents did with my siblings here. But I do think that me having that language was so important. I think it's important that the whole family have that language, right. And that I believe very strongly being honest with children, too. So if it's like you're going to a doctor appointment for your child with Tourette's or whatever it is, and it means you might miss something with another kid, I think saying, hey, yeah, this is an appointment. And I'm going because your brother Jeremy has Tourette syndrome, and it's all doing connect. And I do have to do this. And I know that sucks validate how it might suck, that I will be missing your play. And what are we that we can also why don't we that I can still have that time with you for you. And I think that's a really important balance. But I think the idea of like every kid should get exactly the same. No kid is exactly the same. So of course, he shouldn't get exactly the same. And just like it's unfair that my parents made me have to spend more time and energy on me. It wasn't fair that I had Tourette syndrome. I think it's that's the kind of way that I talked to I talked about it with parents, I'll turn it over to my dad and I would see how accurate was I in terms of what you were doing to say? Look, I

Jeff Lichtman: 27:38

think you're I think you're very accurate. As I would just add that I think it's true about balance for life in general. I live by the motto that in life, anything is possible. Anything is possible, but not everything. Anything but not everything. And therefore. So I think it's important to give no matter what to give time to all of your children. But it doesn't mean that you're gonna give them the same time equal time place about different professions, right, I imagine that many accountants, this time of year, April 15, is the tax deadline, right, that this time of year is a busy time for accountants in particular, and family time, probably decreases for many of them and work time increases. The hope is that you rebalance a little bit and that's post April, April 15. Maybe that's when you take off a couple of days and spend more time with family to try to recalibrate a little bit. But what do you do what you don't? I've had its ups and downs. I will tell you that when I was working on my doctoral dissertation for 10 years, I had finished everything but I've worked on on the dissertation for 10 years, which meant that for nine years, I said I was working on it and didn't. And then the 10th year, okay, you know,

Unknown: 28:52

I jump in. I finished my dissertation. Like six months I was laser focused. I was I was like, I'm getting this done. I get that from my mom. I get that from my mom. She was

Jeff Lichtman: 29:03

absolutely. Anyway, so my wife and I agreed, like I was going to do it or drop, but it meant I was away a lot. And it must have been sometime like in February. I remember Jeremy's older sister came to me. And she said I've uh, yeah, so she was probably at that point eight, nine years old. And nine came to me up, I never see you anymore. You talk about a knife to the heart. I mean, and she didn't mean it that way. By the way. She was just and I said you're right. I felt terrible. And she was right. That year was really difficult to hear. And I did two things. I said to her. Okay, next week, we're going to you and I, Tuesday night, we're gonna go for ice cream. Go to friendlies and just you and me, we're gonna go for ice cream. And I told her that I was hoping that I would finish the shoe like the summer and afterwards again, you and I are gonna we're going to do something together just for a couple of days. So anyway, next week came and Tuesday night we're gonna go to friendlies except as a major snow Storm. I mean, really a major snowstorm. Nevertheless, we went in a major snowstorm where the I was surprised it was even open. We were the only idiots in friendlies. And so again, did that make up for all the time that I wasn't there? No. But as Jeremy said, It validated her feelings. And it also did give her some time, you know, with me alumni, nothing to do with Jeremy and his six, by the way, you know, I live by the motto that in life, anything is possible, but not every, I think it's important to give no matter what to give time to all of your children. But it doesn't mean that you're gonna give them the same time equal time. Think about different professions, right. I imagine that many accountants, this time of year, right, April 15, is, you know, the tax deadline, right. time of year is a busy time for accountants in particular, right, you know, and so, family time, probably decreases for many of them, and work time increases. Right now, the hope is right, that you rebalance a little bit in that post, hey, April 15, you're going to spend you know, maybe that's when you take off a couple of days and spend more time with family to try to recalibrate a little bit. But what do you do it yourself? Everybody's life as the this you know, ups and downs. When I would work on my doctoral dissertation for 10 years, I finished everything, but I was working on on the dissertation for 10 years, which meant that for nine years, I said I was working on it and didn't. Okay, you know,

Unknown: 31:27

I might jump in. I finished my dissertation. Like six months, I was laser focused. I was I was like, I'm getting this done. And I get that from my mom. I get that from my mom. She was happy.

Jeff Lichtman: 31:37

Absolutely. Anyway, so my wife and I agreed, like, this was the way I was going to do it. Or let or drop it. You know, it has to be, but it meant I was away a lot. And it must have been sometime like in February. I remember Jeremy's older sister came to me. And she said, I've uh, yeah, so she was probably at that point, eight, nine years old. Nine, give me up. I never see you anymore. You talk about a knife to the heart. I mean, and she didn't mean it that way. By the way. She was just, you know, and I said, You're right. That year was really difficult to hear. And I did she thing. I said to her, okay, next week's Tuesday night, we're gonna go for ice cream, go to friendlies. And just you and me, we're gonna go for ice. And I told her that I was hoping that I would finish by the summer. And afterwards again, you and I are gonna we're going to do something together, you know, just for a couple of days. So anyway, next week came Tuesday night, you know, we're gonna go to friendlies, except is a major snowstorm. I mean, really a major snowstorm. Nevertheless, we went in a major snowstorm, where we did the Irish surprise, it was even open, who was the only idiots and friendlies again, did that make up for all the time that I wasn't there? No. But as Jeremy said, It validated her feeling. And it also did give her some time, you know, with Milan that had nothing to do with Jeremy and a six, by the way that not to deal with. You want to quote my career microaggression and like, you know, work and stuff like that. So everybody talks about work life balance. I just asked how happy was mom that you were driving out that snowstorm? She was definitely not please, you don't have to pay, right? Jeremy said it, you do the best thing you can. And then please God, if you're lucky enough, your kids grow up, they become adults, they have their own children, and then they blame you for all the things you did wrong. And then they get a chance to make their own mistakes.

Michael Leopold: 33:31

We've mentioned a couple times, Jeremy about the adult support group that you run through Ajay CTS. And some of our listeners may be interested in that. So I'm wondering if you could walk us through a little bit about what that is the kinds of topics how often we meet things like that? No,

Unknown: 33:44

that's great. We meet once a month 8pm. It's a virtual zoo that runs through ljcds. But I facilitate the group. It's the second Wednesday of the month, every month, and we meet for about an hour. Really this came out because I was talking with hat once about this the director of ng CTF, when I read that record in grad school in the chess program, we had this children's skills group that reran on sort of like self advocacy around Tourette syndrome for young kids. And I remembered every time we would go into the waiting room to pick up the parents because the kids would do a little talk at the end about what they learned that day. And the parents were just like talking with each other. And it was just this thing that really stood out to me, I was like, Oh my God, these parents don't have anyone to talk to about this. This is like more than a decade and a half ago. But it really stood out to me how helpful it was for these parents to have this environment where they could just talk to each other and lay out their fears and their hardship and laugh and joke and make fun of their kids a little bit even with other parents who understood and they didn't have to worry that the other parents wouldn't understand. And so I really wanted something like this. And so I was talking to Pat once and I'm like, let's do this. Let's do it to ng CTF. Let's let's run this pair. Let's have the spirit group. I'll facilitate it. It's really a group for parents to support each other and be there for each other. Right? And I'm there to sort of facilitate, just get parents to talk and moderated a little bit, and people definitely come on. And they also ask me a lot of questions, I'm not gonna lie and say that there's no advice given for me that there, I try my best to also turn to other parents to make who else has had this problem or challenge what have they dealt with this before. I know for a fact that there have been a few, at least a few close friendships between some parents based on this group that have formed and parents who kind of you know, have formed their own relationship outside of the group because of this. And so I really see as a as an opportunity for parents to not feel so alone, we so often focus on the child with Tourette syndrome in the work that we do, and the advocacy that we do and everything. And my dad kind of said before, every parent wants their kid to be perfect, where every parent doesn't want their kid to have anything. And it's hard, right? parents go through life with certain expectations, and the first kid comes around, and all of a sudden, somewhere between the age of chew and eat, all these ticks are coming up. And there's no manual to raising a kid that let alone a kid with any sort of special needs or any sort of disability, and he's over diagnosis, having that support, I think is so important to not feel so alone. And I think that as much as the parents I've worked with over the years, like I'm always impressed by the resilience and strength, and they come into my office with and I even in my individual work with kids and families, I see my job as also being there as support for parents. No kid exists in a vacuum. And if we want as an advocacy group, and then jpgs are the clinician via data, whatever, if we want to create the best environment possible for kids with Tourette Syndrome, any sort of disability special need whatever we have to make sure the caretakers are taking care of themselves to we're human, we all break down. That's the support group, once a month on Zoom every second Wednesday of the month.

Michael Leopold: 36:50

If anyone listening is interested, feel free to check that out. We'll put a link to it in the speaker notes so you can get more info there and sign up to close things out. Are there any other tips or advice, or funny stories you want to share? While we're all together here?

Jeremy Lichtman, PsyD: 37:03

I guess I'll say I was excited about this opportunity to do this with my dad. It was really, really big for me as I got older, like learning how much my parents did behind the scenes. Two things I want, I guess is one, I really do appreciate how much my parents did for me both behind the scenes and the obvious sense. And so it's really nice for me when I get both my parents are a psychologist and lo and behold, I was like ecologist my younger my dad ran the nonprofit for 25 years, my younger sister started and runs a nonprofit and is a social worker, the apples are far from me, my oldest sister is a lawyer. We don't know how that happened. Okay, she's okay. Do we have to be a lawyer? Exactly. I think I've been very lucky with the parents I've had. And at the same time, I think it's important that like, for everything I've said, like my parents did have an inherent advantage based on their career paths in terms of being able to create a supportive environment for me. And I guess I hope the message isn't? Well, if you don't get a doctorate in psychology, you're not gonna be able to do this for your kid, right? I hope the messages despite that advantage, right? Every parent has resources, every family has resources, right? And to think about how do I, as a parent, take advantage of the resources, I have to support my child. And it doesn't have to be the way that my parents did for me, I mentioned earlier, like, for all the good that they did not everything was perfect. And there were things that were missed and like the academic piece, and that was a challenge, right? Not having an on ramp to maybe I can do well academically, even the best parents don't do everything perfectly, we can expect every parent to do things perfectly. And I don't expect any other parent to do things perfectly. So I have to call that I hope the message here isn't like you have to be like my parents to be successful. Hopefully, there's some things that based on realize that my dad did that parents can take it will be helpful for them. But really, it's about finding what the resources are and find out what is that balance made that gets talked about to be able to do this effectively for their family.

Jeff Lichtman: 38:46

So that's what I'll say close out. And I'll very quickly in closing say that, look, I think it's really hard for parents probably for most parents, the scariest part of this journey, once they know that they have a child with Tourette syndrome, or really any area to political will get better at is the unknown, you don't know. And you're always worried what's gonna happen, they're gonna get through school, or they're gonna get, they're gonna get married, really, somebody's gonna want to marry them. And it's sort of never ending. The support group. The Jeremy Rogers is a great way, by the way of responding to that on an ongoing basis. Life has taught me, people, children, people are much more resilient than we think. And for the most part, it's going to be okay. It may not be okay in the way that you have a preconceived notion of my son or my daughter is going to be this that or the other thing, and we all have them. Let's be honest, no matter how liberal or open minded we think we are, we will have dreams for our children and boxes that we put them into. If we're smart. We mostly keep them to ourselves at no onek but we do. That's just the way we're wired. And I think if we can just remember that likely accompany don't do anything but don't want to support you because you want out them do whatever you can reasonably and then hope and pray for the best and likely it will be okay. It may not be okay in the way that before you had that drive want to imagine it would be what it might be okay and so many other men are weighing very

Michael Leopold: 40:23

well with their thank you both so much for your time. It's been a great episode and I really appreciate it. Thank you for listening to the uptick, brought to you by The New Jersey Center for Tourette syndrome and Associated Disorders empowering you to stretch the boundaries to live your best life. The NJ center for Tourette syndrome and Associated Disorders NJ CTS, its directors and employees assume no responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, objectivity, or usefulness of the information presented on this podcast. We do not endorse any recommendation or opinion made by any guest nor do we advocate any treatment