Balance Issues

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Hello..When I was young I attempted to ride a bike and fell off of it. (really bad scrapes ensued). As a result, I never ever got on a bike again. But, I'd started to ride adult tricycles. (Since I still wanted to bike.) I was wondering: Could this be due to my Asperger's? Also, have any of you ever had this sort of balance problem?

I haven't been dxed. But I never learned to ride a bike when I was a kid. I tried and tried but just couldn't get it. I just learned. I'm 34. I can do it pretty well, but steering is akward as all get out.

People on the Autism spectrum often have balance and motor skills problems. I did learn to ride bikes as a child, but it took longer for me than for others. When I was very young, my parents entered me and my older sister in dance classes for several years. I had tap for several years, and then a year or two of ballet. I do have balance problems, but even now, in my early 50s I feel that those few years of dance helped me with it somewhat. I think it would even help someone starting dance classes as an adult.

My balance and motor skill problems aren't as bad as many on the spectrum, but do annoy me sometimes. I can write well, but not as fast or as small as other people. I can't chew food fast. I do sometimes get confused as to which hand to use, but on the other hand I am a somewhat ambidextrous left hander, so I can do some stuff pretty good with both hands,-- once I decide on which hand to use.

I suggest that anyone seeking help with balance and motor skills might want to try dance classes, martial arts, other sports, juggling, etc. These are all things that involve practicing using your body in different ways, and that can help improve your balance and motor skills somewhat.

As for using an adult trike bike, that sounds like fun.

I don't recall having a more difficult time learning to ride a bicycle, I spent far more time learning to tie my shoes, maybe it was the different tactiles involved or my brain perceived balancing as the more difficult task.
Last week I attended a small function and after I joked "I'm not isolating, I'm just left-handed" when getting ready to eat, a social worker I know told me left-handed brains work harder to develop motor skills, so I have a theory that from my left-handedness I was more able to do more athletic things.
Posters who mentioned dance classes and other whole-body activities seem to fare better than average from what I've observed. I'm sure karate and gymnastics would be good training as well.

An earlier bicycle thread mentioned removing the pedals temporarily until balance is developed, I was going to have my dad do that for my autie half-brother who can ride a push scooter but hasn't grokked a bicycle yet

I had balance problems growing up and now they are good. I still struggled with it a little bit in high school and it only appeared during warm ups. But walking on the tread mill improved them because I found doing warm ups were easier when I was doing track in my senior year.

I never had troubles riding a bike. I learned when I was six. Learning to tie my shoes was not a problem but it took me a few weeks to learn it all. I was also six.

I have always struggled with cursive though. I don't know if that counts but when I write it I cannot write it fast and still make it readable. If I write it, it's hard to read it and I don't like doing it so I prefer to print. I only write cursive when I sign. I know cursive hand writing is supposed to make it go faster but it doesn't for me. It slows me down when I write.

I also heard from my mother that moon shoes help improve your balance. I have a pair and I remember how I used to stumble and fall in them. but when I got them at age 19 where I worked, I could walk well in them and my mother said "Oh Beth, those will help your balance."

I forget when I started riding bikes - I do remember that I used training wheels for exceptionally long, though. I eventually got rid of them though.

Now I have this road bike from the early 70's (a Campania Professional) which I ride often. I also rode it often to get around the university I went to.

I learnt as a little girl to ride a bike and it did took me longer than others but I learnt it all by myself.

I've just been reading about this kind of thing, and poor sense of balance in autistics may be due in part at least to disordered proprioception. Proprioception is the 'sense' that tells us where our bodies are in relation to the rest of the world: for instance, how far our hand is from that mug of coffee, how to move our fingers to grasp the mug, how hard to grip it to lift it without dropping it, how to hold and move it through space without spilling the coffee, and how to guide the mug to make it arrive at our lips. Proprioception is often disordered to some extent in autistics: it's what makes some of us clumsy. It's also involved in balance. If you've tended to think of yourself as a bit of a clumsy person, it may be that you have proprioception issues.

The proprioceptors are tiny receptors located in muscles and ligaments, as well as other places in the body. For some reason, having weight or pressure applied to muscles and joints helps people with disordered proprioception clarify their body's relationship to the world around them. It's intensely reassuring, and it can reduce overstimulation in autistics: some autistic children benefit from weighted blankets or lap-pads, and I've just discovered that sitting with 15kg of gym weights on my thigh muscles for 20 minutes when I come home from work reduces not only all my feelings of stress but some of my chronic pain – to an extraordinary degree. People vary in their response to this kind of de-stimulation therapy, but it is useful for some.

The best way to develop your proprioception is to do physical work involving weight and force (including working with your own body's weight, which is why the tough work of ballet or contemporary dance training can help). Using resistance machines in a gym, or free weights if you can/want to is especially good, but there are plenty of other sports and activities that involve using weight and force. Just walking up stairs uses quite a lot of muscular force. It's a case of following your own interests and preferences; I don't know enough to be able to say whether this might improve your balance, but if you're one of those who has issues with it, it can only help with your general sense of wellbeing and stress levels.

I didn't learn how to ride a bike until I was 7. But I run into s**t and lose my balance a lot. At the same time though, I'm usually able to catch myself before I fall, but I end up looking like an idiot in the process anyway.

I've always had difficulty with balance. In first grade, our teacher would take us outside for small breaks, where we would do skip running. I could never get the coordination to do the skip, not the balance to execute it properly if I tried. I was also the only 8 year old that couldn't ride a bicycle.
For this reason, the school connected a nurse to me, that was supposed to help me with my balance. I think that really helped, as today I can both skip and ride a bike.

But still, I do still find it a problem sometimes. Never ask me to stand on something that is less than one meter wide, or I will immediately start to wobble.

Additionally, I often experience a sensation of 'floating' or turning, when I'm sitting or lying down. The internet says it does have something to do with balance abilities and such.