Monday 17 June 2013

Stimming

Not heard of stimming before?

Well, most of us do it!

If you tap your toes, drum your fingers on the table, bite nails or shuffle around when bored or nervous, then you are stimming!

Autistic people do it a lot. When my son was younger, he used to stim by tapping parts of his body with his hands. He did grow out of that behaviour, but sometimes does it if he is very angry or frustrated. Apparently, about 10% of people with autism stim.

This weekend, he started a new one. He started drumming the furniture with his hands. Sometimes he gets quite loud. I don't mind it too much, but it can get a bit disruptive if we are trying to watch TV, or if we are out and about in public.

There are lots of good articles on the internet about stimming. Here are a few of them:

http://autism.wikia.com/wiki/Stimming

About.com article


http://myspecialsweetpea.com/stimming.html

I am not overly worried about his stimming habits and if they help him calm down, then I don't have a problem with it.

1 comment:

  1. There seems to be a mix on stimming. I for one believe in it as I thinks its a coping mechasism for some one with autism but some schools try and discourage it.

    I know someone who home schools her son with ASC because she couldn't find a school that would allow and even encourage her children to stim x

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