What is wrong with this old lady who keeps turning in circle

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I'm on a train and this old lady, maybe 70 odd years old, keeps turning in circles

She is literally spinning round and round and humming.

This is the second time in the space of a week when I have seen/heard some weirdness on the same train.

People are just ignoring or pretending not to notice the old lady. Sometimes she stops and looks intently at the ceiling. If someone goes past, she acts normal. There are plenty of seats but she won't sit.

What is going on???

I can't remember seeing so much weirdness when younger, so why is it happening now? Is anyone else noticing this??

Well, first off, spinning and humming are pretty common stims for autistic people - so maybe she's one of those many, many older adults who didn't get their autism diagnosed. But there are other conditions that might lead someone to behave that way - Tourette's Syndrome, dementia, or Parkinson's disease, for example. She might stay standing up just because it's too hard to get back out of her seat if she sits down. There isn't any way to know, and she might not even know the reason herself - and it doesn't sound like she's any inconvenience or danger to anyone, so it doesn't really matter.

Good for her that she's still getting out and about on the train, even though all those people are pretending not to notice her while talking about her behind her back (she probably knows that they do). That's braver than I usually am when I have a really "stimmy" day - I usually get totally freaked out that people will see me flapping my hands and stay at home!

Strangers in the internet do not have access to the woman's medical records.

Nor does it matter

She might not have been conscious of her behavior

She wasn't violating anyone's stupidass "rights"


Please do not ask "what is wrong with" the woman


That sounds condescending


Nobody is perfect

Could be a sign of dementia.

But if she's not causing harm to anyone, we shouldn't judge her unusual behavior any more than NTs should be judging ours.

We don't any trains or subways where I live - except the Subways that sell sandwiches, haha - but it sounds like a way to meet some really "interesting" individuals.

I couldn't care less if an old person was doing that. As long as the person isn't a threat to anyone else and is keeping to themselves then more power to them. I also assumed stimming which is part of why I'd be fine with it. That's a lot better than someone yelling or doing something that would be upsetting to me in a sensory way.

It is an anecdote leading to a bigger question. Did you not see or understand the question...?

If I just asked the question without an example, of which this was the most recent observed incident, it wouldn't make much sense.

In the old days strange people, including those with autism, were institutionalized. Temple Grandin would have been institutionalized except for the heroic efforts of her mom, Eustacia Cutler.

https://autismawarenesscentre.com/shop/ ... ily-story/

The short story of what happened was that the political left and right cut a deal to eliminate the institutions. The right didn't want to pay for the cost. The left wanted personal liberty for those who didn't need to be in institutions.

I think it is only now that people are finally accepting of people who are "different." Each generation does something to piss off the generation in power. I know my boss wondered what the younger generation would do since he did drugs and sex when he was young. And didn't remember what he did!

From what I've read many times here, NTs class anybody with any weird behaviours as murderers. Luckily I have the super skill of actually being able to tell the difference between a person who is a potentially dangerous threat and a person who is acting differently but is harmless. It's an instinct I have. If I saw a person doing something odd in public, my instinct would tell me that they may have a disability and will not harm, where as if a person is looking aggressive or looking for a fight or is swearing at people (or to oneself), I would feel uneasy and I'd probably stare more to see what they're going to do next. And if it's a serial killer, they usually act so subtle that you hardly know they're a serial killer until it's too late, unless they are seen lurking about in bushes or something.

Like lostonearth we don't have any trains or subways where I live either. I never been on one of those but from what I've seen on shows like Ridiculousness, it's fairly common for people on trains/subways to be yelling, assaulting someone, or for a group to start mobbing so an old lady humming & spinning in a circle seems pretty mild.