Truth about Tourette's

Jan 18, 2005

I walked into the bedroom Sunday night, and Erin asked me, “Do you know who Tim Howard is?” I didn’t. “That’s the point of Sixty Minutes,” she said, directing me to a segment on the unknown-in-this-country American goalkeeper for Manchester United. Howard’s got a tough job as goalie of one of the best football teams around – and as an American, no less. Plus, he’s got Tourette’s syndrome. Watch the segment to hear how he blocks out the symptoms while tending goal.

If you watched L.A. Law, like me, you may remember the episode with the guy whose Tourette’s made him swear in court. The Sixty Minutes piece and Jane Brody’s column about Tourette’s in today’s NYTimes are both clear: symptoms of Tourette’s “only rarely include the involuntary shouting of obscenities.”

Anton Zuiker ☄