BellaOnline Forums Health and Fitness Autism Spectrum Disorders STIMS

I wrote an article about self-stimulatory behavior:

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art41323.asp

Please share what type of STIMS your child has had over the years? What about your quirks that you do, like twirl hair or tap a pencil?

I have the habit of biting one of my knuckles. I started this in Junior High and have a terrible callous because of it. Soon after we found out my toddler was autistic I attended an information seminar for the "new parents" just learning about their child's diagnoises. To my surprise several parents said their autistic child bit their fingers. Until that day I'd never heard of anyone biting their fingers, (just finger nails).

My just barely three year old son would constantly say "the rhino will bite you" in any given situation, or, start listing all the zoo animals. He actually is starting to go most of the day without saying anything about a rhino. We put pictures of the rhino at our zoo on the wall and innundated him with rhino toys. And now he rarely blurts out "rhino", and, doesn't seem desperate if he can't find a rhino toy. At first I was a little worried that we were encouraging and ingraining the obsession, but, it seemed to work the other way around. His first few months of preschool he had to have a toy rhino close to him at all times in the classroom, but, then we got some baby rabbits for him to cuddle at home and now he will be happy with a variety of animal toys at school. But animals are still the light of his life. Seeing a book of animals is the best way to calm him when he is beginning to go in melt-down mode.

HI there and welcome to the forum. Thanks for sharing your experiences with your family. I have read a few posts the last few days on some of my groups about kids biting fingers.

One parent said they started putting gloves on the kid and now he wears them at school, although not sure what type of gloves.

I wear white cotton gloves at night to bed to stop the scratching of my eczema while I sleep and use them when doing work in the front lawn since the grass aggravates my skin and I have to wear long sleeves and long pants when watering the lawn, etc.

My son Brett started stimming at the age of 2{yes after his MMR shot!} Although Brett was delayed globaly due to brain abnormalities. This is when we first saw tendencies. He would look at objects with intensity-turning it. Now he will spin anything he can get his hands on. With our son we found that if we limited his ability to stim he would be "with us". He has become an excellent twirler! He also used to flap his arms. He now will flap his hands in front of his eyes. He used to make a GHHHH sound. Now he will sometimes put his fingers in his ears and humm. He loves to play on the computer and will go back and forth on screens. Although this sometimes drives me nuts he does learn from the repetition. I have heard some people say to stop the stim others say let him do it. My problem is that Brett didn't understand when it was appropiate vs not so it was easier to limit it. I've spoken with an autisic adult and she says she holds it together all day and stims when she gets home but I think she was capable of doing this where so of our kids aren't.

Hi, I have a 4 1/2 y/o boy and he stims only every so often. Often with the fluttering of fingers by his face, and looking at things out of the corner of his eyes, even while walking, has bruises to prove it, heehee! I have never tried to stop his stimming, because it doesn't seem to interfere with his routine at home but his support worker at preschool immediatly stops him when he stims. Granted he seems to do it more when he is there. If he starts to get lost in himself with the stimming, I will redirect his attention but for the most part he only does it 4-5 times a day and then only for a short time. Should I stop him or is stimming alright, I have heard both sides of the arguement, and still don't know which to go with!!