This morning I got a call from a police officer who’d been looking at burglary patterns in our area over Christmas. He wanted to ask me about the attempted break-in at the castle on Christmas Eve.
 
I hadn’t spoken to him before so I explained that I had Tourettes and that I’d be making some unusual noises. He giggled, which surprisingly, isn’t an unusual response when I tell people this.
 
Despite his laughter he seemed to have understood, so I carried on with the call without any further explanation until… at the end of the call, as I prepared to write down a reference number he was going to give me, he asked if ‘Biscuit’ was my child or my dog!
 
I told him with some exasperation that ‘Biscuit’ was neither, but that it was a tic. His response was more laughter, but this time it was tinged with embarrassment.
 
We ended the call and I told Mia, my support worker, what had happened. Her reaction was to ask ‘Who’d call their child ‘Biscuit’?’
 
Good question. Should I be more insulted by the police officer laughing at me when I told him I had Tourettes, or by the suggestion that I might name my child after a baked snack?