Epson Salt for Facial Twitches and Tics

Hello, friends. Well, I am finally back to work after a nice spring break followed by a not-so-nice stomach bug that knocked both my kids for a little loop. Ren was sick Sunday. To be honest, I thought she was just trying to weasel out of going to church and I made her go anyway but about halfway through the service I realized she probably did feel bad and sent her on home. John-Heath's school was another rather unfortunate victim to our family's uninvited house guest in that he became sick once at school on Monday. Let's just say they had to bring out the ol' Rug Doctor for the office carpets.

Tonight, was bath time in the big tub for John-Heath. He usually showers in the mornings (taking a much longer shower than any other member of the family) and would take a tub bath every night if we'd let him, but I don't know that our town's water reserves could withstand it. Every so often, though, we'll allow him a tub bath just so he'll be able to soak in water loaded with Epson Salt.

A couple years ago while playing around on the bed one Saturday afternoon, he hit the back of his head so hard on the bed's headboard that he suffered what a pediatric neurologist diagnosed as Post Concussion Syndrome. Within hours after striking his head he began having facial twitches, which really looked almost seizurish and grew worse over the next several days and was joined by a loss of hand-eye coordination. Needless to say, we were very frightened and felt quite helpless.

Now, a few of the doctors were never really sure some of his symptoms were due to the hit to the head and thought it was just coincidental the facial twitches showed up at the same time as that of the accident. One said it was even possible he had just developed a tic (which is fairly common in boys that age, as I was told). You can go here and here to read my original posts on the incident.

During the many nights of Googling the topics of head trauma, tics, twitches, etc., I found several message boards with people who mentioned bathing in Epson Salt as a way to minimize facial and/or body twitches. So, we tried it and it did seem to help.

Those first couple weeks we put him in an Epsom bath at least every other day and then we gradually lowered it to once every month or so and then finally just "as needed".

By the end of a couple months John-Heath's severe twitches (in which he would squinch his eyes so tight it would draw up his cheeks and mouth) had been reduced to some heavy, repeated blinking. Occasionally, though, he would have flare-ups and we would bring out the Epson salt and again it would seem to help.

Well, we've noticed over the past couple weeks that some of the heavier blinking has returned so tonight it was time to throw a few scoops into the tub, which was more than okay with my little guy who will play in water any chance he can get.

P.S. Well, John just informed me that it is almost eleven and I am required to be at work in the morning ;) so I guess I need to turn in. Please overlook any typos, etc. This is strictly a type and publish post kind of night. Goodnight, friends.