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Tactile Sensory Compulsions, Am I alone here??

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Brown06
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18 Oct 2010, 2:26 am

I looked all over the internet for over an hour and couldn't find anything. Usually I can manage to track down whatever I am researching but after endless rephrasing, I give up.

Does anyone else like to compulsively feel their stomach move and gurgle? I have since I was about 8. Its almost not a choice. If I feel it gurgling I HAVE to touch it, even if i am in class, i try to do it subtly. Anyway I enjoy the feeling and I spend hours a day, hurting my wrist, pressing down on my stomach waiting to feel more.

I also have pick dandruff off my hair.

are these related? I havent been able to stop either acts. Dont think I could

*edit* both activities interfere with every day life. I will end up late in the mornings because I lie around waiting to feel my stomach move. I also won't leave the house bc of my hair, and I constantly wear a hat.



StuartN
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18 Oct 2010, 5:19 am

Brown06 wrote:
I looked all over the internet for over an hour and couldn't find anything.


It sounds like maybe an impulse control disorder. The common ones are nail-biting (onychophagia), hair-pulling (trichotillomania) and skin pinching (dermatillomania). When an impulse like this is affecting your life, it is possibly and expression of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

A lot of people here have some OCD features, it is fairly common with ASD.



rmgh
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18 Oct 2010, 7:38 am

You shoud be careful with that, it might be bad for your insides... (actually I have no idea if it is, I'm just in a "you should" mood :P )

I also share your impulse of head picking, except I always have to smell it first before pinging it away. Not very pleasant, I know.... But we're all Aspies and that.... Please dont' hate me...



ocdgirl123
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18 Oct 2010, 9:54 am

This is OCD-like: If I touched on shoulder, the other HAS to be touched as well. I have heard things like this are common with OCD, which I have.



jeffbee
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20 Oct 2010, 2:07 am

ocdgirl123 wrote:
This is OCD-like: If I touched on shoulder, the other HAS to be touched as well. I have heard things like this are common with OCD, which I have.


I have the touch-symmetry thing too. When I was on Ritalin, I picked up so many little tics and tricks that it looked like I was break-dancing, when all I was trying to do was even it out.

I have a ukulele on which I play "symmetrical music" because it soothes me. It mostly pisses other people off.

I "scratch" alot, but its mostly for stimulation, and I always have to even it out symmetrically.