![]() As long as the reason for the pain is still present, your nervous system will keep on sending you those signals. ![]() You really do stop smelling the cat pee. But if you’re in pain, you won’t acclimate to it. This isn’t about attention, this is a physiological reaction. “If you walk into a house with too many cats you may cringe at the strong scent of kitty litter, but if you stay and hang around you’ll stop noticing the smell. As Kristen Lindsmith points out in her blog post on stimming – pain is the one sensation that will overwhelm all others. Why would a person engage in self injuring stimulation? Possibly because their overload or source of anxiety is so overwhelming, it requires a much more serious stimulation to block it out. These can include hair pulling, biting, hitting oneself, hitting the head against something in a harmful way, or picking/nail biting to the point of injury. Far more serious are unhealthy stims like self-injurious behaviors. Stims that are uncontrollable, occur excessively in inappropriate settings, or prevent a child from socially acceptable interaction, may need to be addressed. The theory behind autistic stimming is the same - we’re just the ones who get called out for expressing ourselves more visibly than you!”Īvailable Now In Our Store What is harmful stimming? They’re all natural forms of self-expression. Most non-autistic people impulsively tap their feet, drum their fingers or let out exasperated sighs. It may counteract an overwhelming sensory environment, or alleviate the high levels of internal anxiety these kids typically feel every day.”Ĭhris Bonnello from Autistic Not Weird points out that many non-autistic people exhibit stimming behaviours as well – they just aren’t as visible. Most kids with autism do these repetitive behaviours because it feels good in some way. When I stimmed, sounds that hurt my ears stopped. “When I did stims such as dribbling sand through my fingers, it calmed me down. Temple Grandin described stimming this way: It bothers some people, but I can’t help it.” It’s involuntary, so I don’t always realize I’m bouncing my leg. A common one for me is humming loudly to myself (sometimes with my ears plugged or covered) and most commonly, I’ll bounce my leg. I feel antsy when I’m over stimulated, so I need to move around and let out some noise. “Sometimes when I feel overwhelmed, upset or angry, I need to let it out. Some examples of stimming are rocking, hand flapping, head banging, stroking a piece of cloth all can serve as a calming strategy. A very good blog post from The Mighty explains in detail what those with ASD experience when stimming and why they need to do it. Stimming can help a person with ASD deal with sensory overload, and anxiety in a postive way. While stimming may seem alarming or strange to the rest of us, these behaviours do serve a purpose for those on the spectrum. ![]() Stimming still puzzles many neurotypicals, who often want to eradicate or control stims. Stimming can be a repetitive motion such as hand flapping, rocking, repetition of words or phrases (echolalia), vocalizations, or even the repetitive movement of objects. What is stimming? Stimming – or stims – are a wide variety of self-stimulating behaviours that people with autism may exhibit when experiencing sensory overload or high levels of anxiety. ![]()
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