Tics / Strimming

[Stephanie]

My little 4 year old HF ASD son, keeps wetting his fingers in his mouth then pulling his fingers down his face either side of his nose. He does it more so when he is anxious but also he does it for no reason and finds it difficult to stop. I think it is called strimming or skimming or something.

 

Before this he used to twiddle with his boy bits (but what male doesn't - ha ha!)

 

It is annoying the hell out of us and is the only thing that makes him look visibly different so we would like him to stop. We got him to stop flapping and jumping and he can control that, but how do you stop him from doing the face rubbing?

 

If I tell him not to do it, he either does it anyway without realising or starts doing something else like touching the back of his head quickly.

 

He is very HF and can be reasoned with and has a clear understanding .. any advice?

 

Stephanie

[anxiousmom]

My AS son (who is now 6) had phases of different 'habits' and simply grew from one to the next.

 

I'm not sure how we got him out of them. One tick he had when he was undiagnosed and 5 drove me crackers and I'd scowl at him and keep telling him off -probably didn't help him!!

 

Is there something else that he might be switched onto? I tried giving my boy a stress ball (we actually made it together!) and he would fiddle with it and squeeze it in his pocket?

 

Or maybe (thinking on my feet here) you could get some of that anti nail biting stuff for his fingers to help remind him to stop it?

 

It's so hard. I want my son to act the same as others but when I'm 'together' in myself I can shrug off the world and let him be. I can't say which is best so I try to get a happy medium of him being happy and me coping.

 

If the tic releaves his stress in some way then it might be better him doing this than bottling it up?

 

I know I'm no help.... but worth a try!?

[Brook]

Hi Stephanie,

 

I always believed stimming to be of help, my son stims ie,, jumps on the spot whilst humming, but this is in situations that he finds stimulating or the reverse if he is not stimulated enough, therefore it helps him to cope with that situation, he is also hypersensitive to sounds, which then cause him to stim, but this helps him drown them out and cope with them.

 

He also develops a tic, blinking repetitively when he is highly anxious, he has been doing this for a couple of days lately and getting really cross with it saying "I cant stop flicking my eyes", and thats the point, a tic is uncontrolable, I realised that he was getting highly anxious because of christmas approaching and he needs to be able to see when it is, we made a countdown to christmas chart like we did last year, he crosses of the days as we go, his 'tic' blinking has now stopped.

 

In my opinion it is a case of working out if it is a stim or tic, but I wouldn't personally try to stop the stimming.

 

Brook

[Paula]

My son constantly puts his hands into his mouth and bites his skin.

Ive tried and tried to say dont do that because hes made his hands sozr but to no avail.

 

I too come from the train of thought that even though to us they get nothing out of it for my son it must offer some comfort.He normally does this behaviour whilst relaxing on an evening.

I guess its not harming anyone

 

I did once try giveing him a babys teething ring even though at the time he was 8 years old but it didnt provide the same comfort.

[Blue-Kat]

Hi Stephanie

as long as it's not doing harm, I'd say leave well alone.

 

re:the sore skin on hands

maybe apply some emollients to soothe, especially ones which don't taste too nice.

 

your post reminds me that L doesn't have his hand down his trousers all the time any more.

 

We talked to him about it - many times !- saying it was hugely socially inappropiate to do in public.

We tried to divert the behaviour, to keep his hands busy elsewhere, and quick orders "hands out now" when they drifted back.

 

try to avoid elasticated waist trousers for a bit, and get him dressed in garmets with less easy access e.g. well fitting trousers with flies and button

 

Some of this may have helped but I think in the end he just grew out of it. he 'swooshes' a lot more now. we intervene when it's getting a bit OTT, to try to bring him back .

 

regards

-

Katya

[TuX]

Don't stop stimming as it is the Autistics way of trying to cope with what they are feeling.

Everyone is supposed to stim;whether Autistic or Neurotypical,as stimming can mean anything from biting a pen or rocking etc,so it can be considered a regular human thing to do and shouldn't be stopped.

 

With the stim Paula mentions,or similar (such as scratching skin off) try seeing if they would wear gloves,I unknowingly do those stims when feeling at my worst(?),and find the impact on skin is lessened when wearing gloves.

[reuby2]

Just a note as I have just been trying to find out about "stimming". A friend at school visited a special school as an alternative for her daughter when she moves school, whilst there ,one of the pupils in the " autistic" room started to tap his feet loudly and repetatively perhaps because a stranger was there.The teacher pulled a visual card off the wall which was a pic of a foot tapping with a cross through and held the card in front of the boy and said firmly " NO Tapping", I thought this was harsh, anyway the boy stopped and after about a minute picked up the visual card and put it back in it's envelope on the wall.

 

I didn't agree with this as i had heard that you shouldn't stop them as it's relieveing stress or anxiety, although i didn't know it was called "stimming".

This was a special autistic unit so I don't know......The mum wasn't very impressed anyway!!!

[bid]

Hi Stephanie, and welcome to the forum

 

I hope you don't mind me raising this thought...

 

You mention that you got your son to stop flappiing and rocking.

 

I wonder if by stopping this form of stimming, you might have encouraged an alternative stim, i.e. the face scratching??

 

I too believe that stims should be left alone as much as possible, or an alternative encouraged if the stim is physically harmful.

 

I do hope I haven't offended you by this suggestion

 

Bid

[oracle]

Rita Jordan told me that you should never tell a child with autism to stop doing something unless you can offer them an alternative. She said if you don't like the flapping then ask them to put their hands in the pockets and flap their fingers in there. Personally I think that it's we NT's that can't cope with the stimming because I know that my sons both need to stim. Sometimes it helps them to concentrate and sometimes it helps them to calm down.

 

Carole

Edited December 18, 2005 by carole

[Zemanski]

Com only stims obviously under stress, when he's happy I stim more than he does!

 

the way to stop Com stimming is to relieve the anxiety.

 

An LSA gave him a gemstone because topaz apparently aids concentration

I don't know about it aiding concentration as such but it became a focus for a hidden stim - fiddling with it in his pocket - and solved all those problems with irritating the whole class with his tapping without stopping the stimming.

He calls it his 'thinking stone'.

 

Nemo says he can't fall asleep properly if I'm not stimming (I jiggle my toes constantly) so it can even be positive

 

actually on the research thread Lucas said that there are several reasons for stimming including stress relief, pleasure/relaxation and concentration. He says sometimes it's necessary to help focus the mind and that it may be difficult for some people to learn at all unless they use stims to stop them being distracted by the environment.

 

an interesting point - wonder how many teachers are aware that by stopping stimming they may be preventing learning too?

 

Zemanski

 

Zemanski

[baddad]

Hi Stephanie -

 

The general consensus a few years ago was that any stim you manage to 'control' is likely to evolve into a different one... The new one might actually be more problematic than the original, so it's always worth weighing that up first, and only try to redirect a stim if it is causing major social or personal problems.

I think that's pretty much the case, but I've also observed with my own son that stims actually seem to have a bit of a cycle, and things you haven't seen for a while will start to reappear as a current stim fades out.

My son's include flapping, finger flickering, hair twiddling, finger sucking/chewing, cuff chewing. He also has some behaviours that I think are more 'habit's (hard to say why i differentiate, but they do seem 'different' somehow), like practising his golf back swing constantly and talking incessantly!

I have found that if you try to 'tone down' a stim it can sometimes work, but you have to be wary... for example, to try to help with flapping, I started letting him have a small piece of blutack to roll around in his fingers. It worked well short-term, but he then became fixated on blutack and couldn't 'cope' at any time without it...

Hope that's useful

BD

[LizK]

I don't think you can really stop them as they are part of ASD. I believe that in some ways they can fulfill a useful function like focusing concentration or be a way of self-soothing when anxious. Don't know whether it would be classed as a stim or not but my HFA four yr old is obsessed with doors and related objects, he enjoys opening and closing them pure and simple but we also find they help him calm down if he's hyped up or anxious. Whilst we sometimes limit this, to stop him playing with doors (currently to door on his cheapy CD player) would be detrimental too him. If the stimming is harming him physically then it might be worth trying to replace it for a more benign type of stim.

 

It is annoying the hell out of us and is the only thing that makes him look visibly different so we would like him to stop. We got him to stop flapping and jumping and he can control that, but how do you stop him from doing the face rubbing?

 

I can understand your feelings about this. I find it hard at times when my son does that makes him visibly different. Even worse when you get the stares from ill-informed strangers. For me though I wouldn't want to stop (or make) my son doing something just to make him fit in if it wasn't directly for him benefit too and certainly wouldn't if it was going to cause him distress. It is hard though as you are sort of torn. I would love to be one of those people who really just don't care about the visible differences but maybe I'll get there one day

 

Lx.