bountifulplate

How would you like to spend a moment in the wonderful world of "stimming??" Below is an example from this past Monday afternoon. Dominic is reciting part of a DVD that my sister gave him at least eight years ago that he has watched many, many, many times. According to the Interactive Autism Network, A Partnership of the Kennedy Krieger Institute and the Simons Foundation:   "many individuals on the autism spectrum exhibit some form of repetitive motor behavior.  Just as they may speak a word or phrase over and over again (echolalia), or even just utter the same sound repeatedly, they may flap their hands, flick their fingers, bang their heads, grind their teeth, or endlessly perform other seemingly random physical acts. The psychiatric term for this is stereotypy, but these actions are more often referred to as “repetitive behaviors” or “stimming” – which is short for self-stimulation." We learned a long time ago that when Dominic is...

How many of you out there have ever heard of the word, "stim?" I never had, until Dominic was diagnosed with Autism. Stimming is another word for "self-stimulating" behavior. Two examples of that type of behavior are head banging and spinning around in circles.  Dominic did some head banging when he was a lot littler, but thankfully, it didn't last too long. If you sometimes see a little girl or boy who has Autism wearing a helmet, they most likely are a head banger. Believe me, it's for their own protection. Dominic also likes to turn around in circles and telling him he'll get dizzy is useless. He rarely does that now. There is also verbal "stimming" which is also known as "scripting."  That is the repetition of sentences or phrases. It can be a sentence or phrase heard from a teacher, parent, sibling, friend or possibly even the television or a movie. It could have been something heard yesterday or five years ago.  This is definite...