Tourettes

[majormary]

My husband has had tics and twitches over the years.  He's never been officially diagnosed with Gilles dela Tourette Syndrome.  He shares that he had some seemingly normal twitches and arm movements when he was a small child.  Over the years none of these tics or twitches have ever been very noticeable and most often brought on by being over tired.

 

Since he started Whole30 (April 17th ... and he's 68) he has developed a left eye twitch and symptoms of neck and shoulder twitches/tics that he feels are very conspicuous and obviously he's self conscious about them, but not enough to give up Whle30.

None of this is hindering our life style or is debilitating, just annoying, but obvious.

 

He's really very excited about the Whole30 program and has been doing more cooking than ever in our marriage ... and I'm loving it too.  

 

The obvious question here is:  has anyone else on this forum experienced such a condition since starting Whole30? or feel the Whole30 program contributes to such a condition? ... and/or ... has anyone experienced a healing effect of such condition giving tribute to the Whole30 program?

 

Thanks.

[Physibeth]

I don't have any experience with this condition (though I know tiredness will bring on twitches for me...very minor). So my question is how is his energy levels? Is he getting enough sleep? Has he been feeling run down? 

 

Giving us an idea of what he is eating, drinking, how he is sleeping, and his stress and activity levels can help us help you. There really shouldn't be anything about eating clean whole foods in proper portions that would cause issues.

[majormary]

Physibeth:

Thank you for such a quick reply.

His energy levels are good.  He loves to fish and goes fishing as often as possible.

He does yard work when needed as well.

He sleeps good ... better than I do   ... and doesn't appear to need naps during the day.

He's cut down to one cup of coffee a day - first thing in the morning we sit on our patio and drink black coffee and watch the sun rise

He is thinking about cutting out coffee altogether.

He also takes vitamins daily.

 

I was just wondering if he might need more ... "whatever" ...  in his diet that we might not get with the Whole30 food plan.

I did read on this forum that some might not be getting enough salt on the program, or potassium, or vitamin [add a letter here].

 

So ... I just thought if someone else had experienced these symptoms maybe it's a matter of "time" for the body to "act" or "react" to healthy eating.

We'll just keep watching it.

Thanks again for your response.

[Karen]

Look into adding magnesium to his diet.  It may or may not be the source of the added twitches, but it might be something to research a bit more.  

[FlyingCrow]

I don't know the answer to this but I would suggest reading Grain Brain, which I have just started - Tourette's and other neurological issues seem to be linked to gluten consumption, but this is the book to read to find out more.

I would just share this: I have noticed some of my long term problems getting worse before they get better, for example I sporadically have balance problems after I've been lying down. Two weeks into my whole30 and suddenly I was worse than I'd ever been before, falling over almost and lurching about like I was drunk.

It really disturbed me actually, but it has gone now. Obviously I don't know if it will come back again, but according to the neurologist who wrote the book above, balance issues are also sometimes linked to gluten.

My Rosacea also got markedly worse too, but it's improving now so it may be a case of trying to wait it out.

David Perlmutter is the author.