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Unhealthy Stimming

K

What unhealthy stims do you do/or have done?

Mine would be grinding my teeth, biting my lips and pulling my hair or chewing it. And bending my fingers.

I’m not aware I’m doing it though. People point them out to me, or, I suddenly realise my lips are bleeding where I’ve bitten too hard and too deep. Part of it is caused by anxiety as well. I have generalized anxiety disorder, constantly worrying about all sorts, though I can never work out what it is I’m actually worried about! Can never find the reason/trigger. I guess I worry sub consciously. It all leads to my stimming unhealthily which is a total nightmare. My lip biting has resulted in altering my smile, not that I had a cute smile to begin with but it’s sad to see and know.

Healthy stim for me is hopping and dancing. Both I love so much.

  • Biting my fingernails / skin around nails.

    When REALLY bad I have gnawed a finger so bad it has to be bandaged up and takes ages to heal.

  • in reply to Autumn_Trees

    Yeah, I ended up mentioning a few of these types of things during my PIP assessment, saying that it’s largely-subconscious and I just can get lost in it, only realising later that is was an issue.  
    But I then had a GP contact me asking for a routine check-up for “something”. I thought ‘NHS? Check-up? Routine? I didn’t know the NHS was even aware of those three words’. 
    When he phoned me up I got all of this ‘Self-harm’ scripted dialogue, then he said that I’d been flagged because the PIP woman railroaded me into this whole psychological-drama, after I spent 20 minutes explaining the difference to her.
    Then it was almost impossible to stop the GP riding the self-harm train, I just thought this the NHS and Civil Services must have no training for autism at all, you’ve literally got to inform them in-call.. 

  • My stims are largely okay, in that they aren't hurting me in any way. 

    Apart from my itching. I will get an itch on my body and I will scratch and scratch and scratch, until total distraction. I'll scrape off all the skin and bleed and then it will leave a big scab and that will scar. Sometimes they're small but sometimes they're really big, and then I'll itch them by mistake when they're healing, and they'll bleed again and heal again and it's a bit of a cycle. 

    I'm trying to be more mindful of when I find myself mindlessly scratching now to say "NO" and focus on something else. 

    It's the mindlessness that gets me, I don't even notice it's happening until too late sometimes. 

  • Ah yes.. Self-injurious Behaviours.. I have always found this one strange to explain to service-providers, because whenever you mention it they jump the phrase ‘self-harm’, which has a psychological-connotation attached to it. I find that the sensory-soothing and sensory-seeking neurological issues are largely misunderstood by professionals.  
    Sometimes it’s just the case that one has a lesser-ability, to process pain which comes across as pleasure, for example having too-hot a shower. Sometimes we have a high sensitivity to something, that means that we try to disrupt it to the point of injury, for example wearing too-many clothes to mitigate a touch sensitivity which can lead to overheating or rashes. 
    I find that the topic of unhealthy-stim/ self-injurious behaviour, is too easily railroaded into the psychological-realm, and the professional-standard is to link it to stress or low-mood.. but honesty I stim healthily and unhealthily for all kinds of reasons..

  • I continually rub the back of my right hand over my nose and lips. Usually, when I'm thinking or stressed. 

  • I bite the tip of my tongue, plus I grind my teeth and fidget with a string/rubber band.