L ifestyle /C ulture
Comedian Talks About Life With Tourette Syndrome
ARTS SOPHIE PANZER | JE STAFF
AS A TEENAGER, Pamela
Rae Schuller felt like having
Tourette syndrome (colloqui-
ally known as Tourette’s) made
her a waste of space.

As an adult and professional
stand-up comedian, she loves
her disability.

“Tourette’s can be hard, and
frustrating and even painful. It
can also add incredible things
to my life, if I am brave enough
to allow it,” she said.

She spoke about her journey
to self-love through humor
during her talk “What Makes Me
Tic: Comedy, Disability, and the
Inclusive Community.” Jewish
Family and Children’s Service
of Greater Philadelphia and
RespectAbility hosted the event
in honor of Jewish Disability
Acceptance, Awareness and
Inclusion Month and Jewish
Disability Advocacy Month.

“Every February, we see
our goal is to bring aware-
ness about disabilities and
the importance of advocacy
for disability rights,” said Lisa
Ney, director of programs and
services for persons living with
disabilities at JFCS. “And this
program is in honor of the
culmination of a month-long
programming that we’ve had
towards this goal.”
Schuller explained that
Tourette is a neurological
disorder that causes her to
experience tics, or movements
and noises she can’t control.

These can include moving
her fingers and toes, winking
uncontrollably, tensing her
stomach muscles and barking.

“I like to explain Tourette’s
as like a fence in your brain.

Well, in my fence, there is a
tiny piece missing. So signals
are seeping through that I
didn’t mean to send,” she said.

She said she had the worst
diagnosed case of Tourette in
the country as a teenager. She
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Karen Beth Staller, left, provides ASL interpretation as Pamela Rae Schuller discusses disability advocacy.

I like to explain Tourette’s as like a fence in your brain. Well, in my
fence, there is a tiny piece missing. So signals are seeping through that
I didn’t mean to send.”
PAMELA RAE SCHULLER
often lost control over her body
and injured herself, whether
through rupturing her own
appendix or throwing her head
back so hard she broke her
neck. The physical injuries were
not as painful as the emotional
toll of exclusion. Peers and
educators treated her as if she
was nothing but a disturbance,
and those who did include her
seemed to consider it a chari-
table act. She spent much of
her youth feeling like she was a
burden on her community.

Moments that made her feel
included and supported helped
change her perspective. There
was the time her peers walked
out with her when a religious
school teacher at her synagogue
told her she was being disrup-
tive and asked her to leave.

There was also the math
teacher who, instead of kicking
her out of class when she
started making noises, told her
she sounded like a metronome
and asked if she would like to
write a song about math.

She got excited about the
idea, as did the rest of the class,
and they ended up writing and
recording a whole CD together
with her tics included as
background accompaniment.

“And in that moment, this
idea of inclusion shifted,”
she said. “It stopped feeling
like what people couldn’t do
because I was there and started
feeling like what people got to
do because I was there.”
Taking improv comedy
classes in high school also led
to a breakthrough. The concept
of “Yes, and,” or the rule
that improvisational actors
cannot contradict each other’s
reality, helped her discover
her sense of humor and love
for performance without
having her Tourette constantly
scrutinized. “When I would join the
scene, flailing or barking or
making noises, they ‘Yes,
and-ed’ me,” she said. “I was
getting laughs, and not because
of Tourette’s, but because
people were starting to see
these other parts of me.”
Comedy has helped her
recognize the silliness of preju-
dice, like when an eyebrow
JEWISH EXPONENT
Screenshot by Sophie Panzer
which promotes mental health,
wellness and resilience through
creativity. She said it was important
for people to move past “toler-
ance,” a word that sounds like
nails on a chalkboard to her,
and embrace full inclusion.

“Nobody wants to just be
tolerated,” she said. “Every single
person has value, and every
single person has struggles and
challenges, and we should be
celebrating what each person
brings to our community.” l
waxer berated her for not
trying hard enough to control
her body right before audibly
farting. In addition to her career
as a comedian, Schuller has
a master’s degree in child
advocacy and policy and
launched an initiative for spanzer@jewishexponent.com;
Jewish teens called Here.Now, 215-832-0729
Name: WWDB AM 860
Width: 3.625 in
Depth: 3.62 in
Color: Black
MARCH 11, 2021
27