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Aspie202
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26 Oct 2015, 4:10 pm

I was wondering, does biting nails until they bleed a type of stimming? I was also wondering if making a faint "hmph" sound is a type of stimming. These are things I like to do.


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Earthling
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26 Oct 2015, 4:56 pm

I sure love to make a "hmph" every once in a while.



NowhereWoman
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26 Oct 2015, 5:31 pm

Aspie202 wrote:
I was wondering, does biting nails until they bleed a type of stimming? I was also wondering if making a faint "hmph" sound is a type of stimming. These are things I like to do.


It could be, especially if you don't think it's just a nervous habit or something.

I used to vocal stim a lot. Little soft grunts and clearing my throat and things like that. I enjoyed the physical feeling it produced in my throat; it wasn't because I actually needed to clear my throat or anything.



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26 Oct 2015, 5:39 pm

Most likely. Even if making your nails bleed isn't intentional, if it's done for more than just anxiety purposes, I'd probably call it stimming. I do a lot of vocal stimming too, including repetitive random noises and repeating dialogue and phrases from various TV shows over and over.


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26 Oct 2015, 5:51 pm

Aspie202 wrote:
I was wondering, does biting nails until they bleed a type of stimming? I was also wondering if making a faint "hmph" sound is a type of stimming. These are things I like to do.


It can be, although many people refer to it as a "harmful stim." It is nothing to be ashamed of or embarrassed about, though - lots of people have harmful stims (I've had the exact same one you mention ever since I was 11 or 12) and there's even a support blog for it on Tumblr. I happen to think the term "harmful stim" is subjective, though - that is, if you don't see it as harmful, then it doesn't have to be considered that way. I think the "hmph" sound you mention might be a kind of vocal stim. :)


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27 Oct 2015, 8:26 am

When it comes to stimming my motto is....it's not what you do, but what causes you to do it. Therefore most anything can be called stimming, if you are doing it to cope with sensory overload due to autism.