For those who do stim, a question about what drives it.

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Is there an internal force that seems to drive your stimming?

For pretty much my whole life, there was a force that seemed to "push" my body into stimming, and resisting could be done but felt horrible. I don't mean like the force that's behind Tourette-like tics (I have those too and it's different). I mean a force that I associate with... this is hard to describe. I associate it with a feeling of constant strain and stress, with the color yellow (synaesthesia?), with adrenaline, a scraping feeling on my skin, an intense "driven" quality, and other things like that. And it felt like when I did many kinds of stimming, that force was behind it and driving it every step of the way.

Then, very suddenly, that force was gone. This happened a few years ago when something happened... it was either me acquiring a new medical condition, or a new expression of an old one (it affects energy, movement, and muscle tone). Compared to before, I barely get stressed out at all now. It can be done, but what I consider nerve-wrackingly stressful now is far less than my everyday level of stress before all this changed. This is borne out (without my realizing it at the time) by tests of galvanic skin response (a measure of physiological stress) at MIT, where in the past my level was sky-high (and every single voluntary movement I did made it higher -- an objective sign of how difficult it is for me to move even on good days, something that I thought only I could subjectively see... meanwhile involuntary and triggered movements didn't make it higher at all, and stimming made it lower). But then suddenly right after I acquired that problem, my level became so low it could barely be measured. And the driven feeling stopped.

I still stim, but it's a different kind of stimming than the "driven" stimming. Most of the time, it's only finger movements (those happened before, too, and weren't caused by the "driven" feeling). The intense rocking and stuff has gone away. The stimming that does exist usually has a gentler quality to it and seems to be more the stuff that was about responding to and understanding my environment, than the "driven" stuff.

So I wanted to know if others had this experience of that "driven" feeling driving at least some of their stimming as well, or if it's just me. I think I've seen a quality in some other people's stimming that reminds me of the driven feeling, but from the outside there's only so much I can know about it, which is why I'm asking.

Hmmm.

My primary stim is pacing. I would say that is is driven by something. I just can't stand still. So I shift from one foot to the other, pace back and forth, rock forward and back on the balls of my feet, bounce on one foot then the other. I will stop myself then find myself doing it again a short while later.

I suppress the desire to spin wildly with my arms outstretched. Sometime I just WANT to do that. Sort of a childlike twirl. I'm 53. Why the hell would I want to do that? But I think it would feel awesome.

I don't know if this is real stimming but all I know is when I play around with this part of my body it really helps relax me. It just comforts me.

It relaxes me so anything that causes me anxiety will drive stimming. Also anytime I need to relax more (like in bed and I want to sleep) will drive stimming. I would bet that it releases the same sorts of chemicals that any addicting thing releases to our bodies.

Yes.

I fidget with my fingers constantly, but I'm not typically aware of it unless somebody points it out to me or I happen to look at my hands. It would be fair to say that I feel "driven" to do this, because I can't seem to stop (I start up again as soon as I stop concentrating on not fidgeting). I always need to be moving, and often this is the only appropriate movement I can engage in.

When I need to rock, or pace, or shake/flap my hands (I don't know if this is hand flapping....it looks like I'm vigorously shaking water off my hands) it's because my nervous system is too geared up by fear, joy, anger, etc. and it's like I need to use up the excess of neurochemicals that are flooding my system by engaging in lots of repetitive movement.

My stimming is constant and seemingly automatic. I wiggle my toes, rub my feet together and twitch my nose. I can't stop any of those behaviors for more than a few minutes. As soon as my attention wanders I'm back at it.

The driven part comes when I see something that really bothers or angers me on TV, or even if I'm just thinking about it. It usually involves some variation of man's inhumanity to man. I'll be thinking about it and letting it get to me, and then I sort of black out and next thing I know I'm out in the front yard frantically running about in circles. This is clearly driven behavior, and I believe it is driven by frustration at the monstrous cruelties and injustices that I can do nothing about.

I've reached the point where I'm only watching the weather channel and SPEED on TV. The news is just too horrible anymore for my peace of mind. A while back I was watching TV and channel surfing and in one run through all the channels I saw four pretty young women being brutally murdered on four different channels at the same time. I almost melted down over that and haven't watched the network channels since. IS this what NTs really want to watch? And if that's true, no wonder the world is so screwed up.

I pace, I trace the lines of my body and face, I pick the skin off my hands and feet (I really hate that one), I tap things as I walk by them, I avoid stepping on cracks, etc. To me, it is a comfort.

Either boredom or anxiety causes me to stim. Sometimes, it could be that I like the sensations coming from stimming.

Under stimulation and sensory stress.

There are different types of stims for me, with different causes and results.

The most "violent" stims are caused by loud rock music, pain, or some other intense sensory blast. This is where I shake an appendage back and forth extremely quickly or hit myself. These are usually controllable once I realize I am doing it and can change it to a gentler stim.

But usually something emotional causes me to stim, good or bad. Like the guy I am crushing on coming and talking to me, or me finding out my college minister is moving away. Like you said, it is this overpowering feeling like I need to do something. These are not as controllable and just need to happen for me to process information. Like the other day something happened and I just had to stop what I was doing for a couple of minutes and stim before I could get my mind back on what I was doing.

The last type of stim is pretty much voluntary to make me calm down. These include rocking back and forth, gently tugging on my hair, repeating something I've memorized, and sucking my thumb. (Yeah, I'm 21 and still suck my thumb when extremely upset) I initiate these at the brink of the consciousness to calm me down when I realize I am getting anxious. But I don't suck my thumb in public.

I stim a lot, I mean when I'm not paying attention to my body, I stim and don't realize it. I can stop myself once I do, but I start back up again when I focus on something else.

When I'm overstimulated or anxious or stressed, I stim a lot to release these things, which helps a lot in some circumstances.

I am not sure whether I am driven or not. I don't feel like there's anything conscious going into my stimming, it often just happens.

Throughout my interactions with people ive seen many people aspie/adhd or NT stim. Shaking their legg, touching their beards, flipping a pen around their fingers. Even spinning coins etc. Spinning their thumbs(not sure how its pronounced in english). People who abuse amphetamines for instance will stim alot espessialy when they are on the drug. I think its normal for most people to do some sort of stimming and its a part of natures way of calming oneselves. Whats really the difference between aspie stimming and adhd/NT stimming? Can anyone give me some examples?


I usually shake my legg or touch my beard if i don't care to shave myself for a few days. Things that are somewhat comfortable for me to do. Why i do it i dont know. It can be related to restlessness but it does not have to be that. If i have a knife in range i might "feel the need" to cut something. Like my computer desk or maybe a piece of plastic which would be thrown in the trash anyway. Chewing on small pieces of plastic is one thing to.

Is stimming something people here are ashamed of?

Being conscious is what seems to cause it for me. It stops when I'm asleep, unwell or listening to music.