Stims

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My apologies if this is something that has been talked out, but each time I attempt a search the site tells me it has been disabled...

Anyhow, I have done some searching to dig up information about stims and well, each time I do, I feel I come up short. I cannot think of any behaviours that myself or my daughter have the would be considered "stimming", but that is only based on some websites that spoke about young children/autism/common stims.

Anyone care to have this conversation?

Explain this stimming?

Or give me examples of the wide variety of stims?

I am sure I just saw a post about stripped shirts and stimming...but I am not really sure I understand.

I always thought 'stimming' meant self stimulation. But I think it covers repetitive things like rocking.

My main stims are hair tr=wirling and "handwashing". I used to have others though. Stimming is absolutely more than the stereotypical movements mentioned by autism websites Actually, everyone stims, only autistics do it in a more noticeable way.

I am aware of stereotypical stims such as hand flapping/wringing, rocking, head banging, spinning objects, lining items up, splashing water, etc

But then I have heard of striped shirts, listening to the same song over and over again, excessive drawing etc and this is where the lines become blurred for me because if these are considered self stimulating behaviours then I guess we WOULD have stims....but I am confused about why these sorts of things are considered stims.

Anyone?

I think there's a lot of confusion about this on WP - I see a lot of posts where people say they're "stimming on the internet," or the one you mention about stimming on striped shirts and the like. Or driving as stimming. At least from what I understand of stimming, none of those behaviors are actually stimming (although they may well be Asperger's related). Internet work may be an obsession with technology or whatever you happen to be researching, you may see patterns or mesmerising colours in striped shirts, but they don't meet the criteria for stimming as I understand them, anyway. From Wikipedia:

stimming purely relief from sensory overload?

Useful list of stims (and their primary function) from Aspie-quiz version 8: http://www.rdos.net/eng/aspeval/stim8.htm

fantastic.

thank u!

hmmm, some of the things on that list i didnt realize as stims. Like doodling, im been doing that sence Kindergarten. Guess i learned something new today.

My son has had many of the stims that are on the list. He has licked and chewed his lips until they are purple, pulled all his eyelashes off, sings to self, hums, grunts and swallows hard repeatedly to clear his ears even though he tells me nothing is wrong with them. Usually these stims occur one at a time. He does them more when he is stressed, and he is usually unaware that he is doing them until I bring it to his attention. He doesn't know why he does them. When I see him do one repeatitively over a couple of days, I will ask him if something is bothering him. Sometimes he'll say yes, and we'll talk about it. Sometimes they'll last a couple of days...sometimes months, but they all eventually go away or are replaced with something different.

Stims can be so many different things to handwringing, to handflapping, to rocking back and forth to just tapping of the feet. You can also stim off of something like I bite my boyfriend sometimes, which is not good haha but its a way I stim off of him.

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