Teen with Tourette’s reveals the brutal realities of living with the disorder in eye-opening video of herself shaking her head uncontrollably and knocking over glasses while eating dinner
- Sophie Adams, 16, has been using social media to try and spread awareness for Tourette’s, which involves repetitive movements or unwanted sounds
- In the video she posted on TikTok last week, Sophie and her friend, who also has Tourette’s, can be seen having dinner with their family and friends
- They are both shaking their heads uncontrollably, and Sophie starts knocking over the glasses in front of her while they’re eating
- The clip has been viewed more than 6.9 million times
A teen who has Tourette syndrome has shared an eye-opening video documenting how the neurological disorder causes her to shake uncontrollably and knock over glasses while eating dinner with her family.
Sophie Adams, 16, has been using social media to try and spread awareness for Tourette’s, which involves repetitive movements or unwanted sounds known as tics that are difficult to control.
‘I want to show other people who have Tourette’s that there are other people in the world just like them and that it is OK to be unique,’ she told BuzzFeed News.
Using her platform: Sophie Adams, a 16-year-old who has Tourette syndrome, shared a video of herself trying to eat dinner at a restaurant to raise awareness of the neurological disorder
Uncontrollable: In the video she posted on TikTok last week, Sophie and her friend, who also has Tourette’s, can be shaking their heads up and down, and she knocked over a glass
In the video she posted on TikTok last week, Sophie and her friend — who also has Tourette’s — can be seen shaking their heads up and down while eating a family dinner at a restaurant.
Sophie’s pal bangs his fist on the table a few times, and then she starts knocking over the glasses that are in front of her.
‘Move the rest of the glasses now,’ someone says in the background, but no one listens. Sophie ends up hitting two more glasses before the clip ends.
‘Dinner with two people with tourettes,’ she captioned the footage.
Hard to handle: Sophie knocks over a few more glasses before the video ends
Chipping in: Sophie also shared a follow-up video that shows everyone chipping in to clean up the table before they left the restaurant
Real life: Sophie wishes more people knew that Tourette’s sufferers have different tics — and not everyone curses
The viral video has been viewed more than 6.9 million times and has received thousands of comments. Sophie also shared a follow-up video that shows everyone chipping in to clean up the table before they left the restaurant.
Some TikTok users who have a limited understanding of Tourette’s accused her of knocking over the glasses on purpose while others berated for not apologizing.
‘I do say sorry, first of all. I feel extremely bad about it and we do clean up everything,’ she explains in another clip. ‘We do not make the waiters clean up. We do it all.
‘My family and my close friends who were there are used to this,’ she added. ‘They don’t care. My friend’s family has three kids with Tourette’s and we were all together. Anything can be a tic, from running into walls to moving your head to hitting glasses.’
Diagnosis: The teen was diagnosed with Tourette’s when she was nine years old, a few years after she started experiencing tics
Doing good: Sophie, who has more than 360,000 TikTok followers, has been using her platform to educate others about the disorder
The teen was diagnosed with Tourette’s when she was nine years old, a few years after she started experiencing tics.
She told BuzzFeed News that she wishes more people knew that Tourette’s sufferers have different tics — and not everyone curses.
Sophie, who has more than 360,000 TikTok followers, has been using her platform to educate others about the disorder while making it clear that it’s not a mental disability.
‘A lot of people think I am incapable of doing things that a neurotypical person can do,’ she said ‘It is also frustrating when people use Tourette’s as a punch line to make a joke.’