I love to stim.
I have engaged in sensory seeking behavior, including self stimulatory behavior, or “stimming” since I was a toddler. However, back in the 70’s my family just thought I had weird quirks. For instance, I sucked on a pacifier (my beloved “binky”) until I was 5 years old. I loved the smell and taste of my binky and was devastated when my dad threw it away. He didn't know I was autistic at the time and just figured it was time to get rid of a bad habit. Once my binky was gone, I continued to repeatedly press my nose into my lip, especially when I was anxious, and to feel the sensation and smell of my saliva. I found the repetitive motion rather soothing. Sure, it sounds weird or even gross to some, but for me, I didn’t think much about it. I still don’t. At almost 50 years old, I still engage in this specific stim behavior when I am anxious and it calms me down and helps me focus. Thankfully my partner is accepting of my stims-they also help him know how I am feeling in certain situations or settings.
Stimming makes sense to me as an autistic person. However, for a lot of people, including other autistic individuals, they don’t see how “stimming” for an autistic person is any different from a non-autistic person fidgeting with something or laying under a soft blanket. My response to any confusion around stimming is this:
Stimming is foundational to an autistic individual; the repetitive motions, movements or sounds are how we focus, concentrate, feel calm and emotionally regulated in environments that constantly create sensory overwhelm and unpredictability. Autistic individuals may stim intensely if we are especially stressed out by people, places, or things in our environment (e.g. bright fluorescent lights, loud noises, too many people, conflict, change in schedule or routine, smells, certain sounds, things that cause tactile defensiveness).
This is not necessarily something that a non-autistic person requires in order to function, focus, concentrate, and be around people or get through our day. But it is definitely core to who I am. I have many different stims that help me manage my daily life. For instance, when I am in a therapy session meeting with clients, I take copious notes. Holding a pen and writing helps me focus on my client. If I am not doing that, I hold onto a piece of selenite; the texture, hardness and shape is another tactile stim tool that helps me listen. If I don’t have that, I have a specific coffee mug with warm water that is a very soothing oral stim. If I don’t have any of these, I tend to play with my hair (which can be distracting to my clients so I make sure I have another stim in place). Looking into a screen for an hour or more let alone at a person’s face is exhausting and painful at times, not because of anything more than that I am autistic. Eye contact and focusing on someone is simply challenging for me. That is my reality. So stimming helps me navigate these challenging situations. Most of the world doesn’t understand this and expects those of us who are autistic to “tough it out” like everyone else, but there is only so much emotional and physical bandwidth an autistic person has to be around other people and operate in this ever-changing world. It makes complete sense to me why so many autistic individuals end up with food addictions, substance addiction and/or pornography addiction with problems compulsively masturbating….there is a whole lot of sensory seeking behavior going on to navigate the craziness of our world!
I was excited when I found out that there are different types of sensory seeking behavior that autistic people may engage in. However, we often only hear about or talk about “stimming.”
Below is a list of other sensory seeking behaviors that autistic individuals may engage in:
Oral: Typically chewing or sucking on something including our nails, end of a pen, a sucker, drinking anything, and for some, smoking. Some autistic individuals may enjoy giving oral sex because of how another person’s genitals feel in their mouth. While others may not enjoy it due to taste, touch and smell.
Auditory: Music, sounds, noises; repeating words, phrases or songs. Loud music can at times be enjoyable while at others noises in the background can cause irritation and even a melt down or shut down. Some autistic individuals may enjoy the sound of people making noises during sex while others may find it repulsive.
Vestibular (“stimming”): Spinning, flapping hands, rubbing on objects, twirling around, rocking back and forth or side to side, dancing. Masturbation could be a form of vestibular sensory seeking since it is a repetitive back and forth motion. It also fits under tactile sensory seeking (below).
Olfactory: Smells (I smell everything-good or bad!); some may seek yummy smells (perfumes, candles, for instance) while others may feel calm smelling foul smells. Some autistic individuals may struggle with the smell of body parts including semen or menstruation. Some autistic individuals may struggle with kissing due to the smell of their partner’s breath or saliva.
Tactile: Seeking touch from others, objects, textures, surfaces; hugs, soft blankets, soft socks, stuffed animals, and certain textures of clothing. Some autistic individuals are tactile defensive and averse to certain articles of clothing due to the texture as well as certain forms of touch (e.g., light touch). Some autistic individuals may struggle with cleaning up during a menstrual cycle or cleaning up after sex or masturbation due to the feel of the bodily fluid. Masturbation is often a tactile sensory seeking behavior that creates a sense of relaxation and proprioception in an autistic' person’s body. The repetitive movements can be incredibly soothing all the while creating a huge spike in dopamine via orgasm. Some autistic individuals may also enjoy kissing because of the soft texture while others may not.
Visual: Being captivated by visual patterns, moving objects, specific colors, shapes. Examples include: binge-watching shows on television, playing video games, starting at flashing lights or moving shapes that are seen on screens, kaleidoscopes, staring at anything when tired or overwhelmed. Some autistic individuals may be captivated by porn which serves a dual purpose; 1) it feels arousing to watch, 2) it also gives them a sense of having their sexual needs met void of the stress of having to deal with all the unknowns and communication challenges dating.
This may be the first time that you are reading about stimming and other sensory seeking behaviors. As you get to know your and/or your loved one’s (e.g., partner or family member) stims as well as other sensory seeking behaviors my hope is that you will be curious about which ones are helpful and which ones may get in the way of your day to day life. Sometimes, we use stims or other sensory seeking behaviors that are not the most adaptive (e.g., when I repeatedly sing a song out-loud 100 times my friends and co-workers get annoyed). Finding other ways to stim or sensory seek that are more aligned with our daily lives may be worthwhile (e.g., doodling in a meeting instead of biting all my nails off while on a zoom call).
Here is a resource for Stim Toys~I recently came across the website: Stimtastic.co created by autistic genus Cynthia Kim. I am a huge fan! Cynthia wrote the book Nerdy, Shy and Socially Inappropriate… This is my favorite book about autism of all time! I purchased several stim toys from Cynthia’s website and I am excited to try them out and share them with my clients. Check out stimtastic.co!
Happy stimming!
photo credit: en.wikipedia.org