Unmasking in public is really difficult if you were forced to mask as a kid. It takes tiny tiny steps of experimenting with small things you wouldn’t normally do in public (sit weirdly on a chair, fumble your hair, play with a pen etc). It helps to first experiment around people you trust. The goal is that you learn to focus on your personal needs instead of the people around you.

Masking is super tiring because you’re trying to appease so many people at the same time while ignoring your own needs and feelings. When you get home, you have to process all of the things you weren’t able to process while you were out in public. Realising this cost to masking motivated me to start to try to learn unmasking in public.

I play drum beats with my teeth

Here’s a list of crap I do at work (office) when I need to get my noggin joggin

Crack knuckles

Tap pen (DO NOT CLICK)

Hum

Stretches

Bounce leg(s)

Just scribble on some paper. Like not even a drawing or doodles, just let your hand go

Run your finger around the top of a mug

My stim of choice was bred by not being allowed to be openly autistic. You know those smooth shirt tags? The kinda satin-y feeling ones? I’m constantly rubbing those against themselves. I even have satin pillowcases so I can stim on those. I was never allowed to show signs of autism as a kid so I hit my autism, and that’s one of the ways I did it.

I have a bad habit of picking at the loose threads of my shirts which is destructive and I am working on stopping that. A less destructive one is right after laundry, pulling the lint out of the pockets of my jeans is so good.

As far as items, I carry around a bolt action pen that is super satisfying, albeit a little loud at times. It helps that it’s an every day item, so at least it doesn’t attract its own attention outside of the noise it makes when I use it.

Other than that, I’m also a drummer, so playing rudiments with my fingers and feet is inherent and I guess is stimming as well.

I also used to stim as a child and don’t anymore. I had a very specific arm-flapping thing I used to do, but I got made fun of for it a few too many times, and I straight up won’t do it anymore, even when alone (occasionally I get so over-stimulated that I’ll flap just a lil, but almost never). It’s too bad, it’s quite a satisfying motion for me, but oh well, it is what it is! Now I just bite the inside of my cheek or dig my nails into my palms. Much less pleasant, much easier to hide.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you, and I don’t have any advice, but just know that you’re not alone! Society has a way of beating harmless but “weird” habits out of people, which is a shame, I have to say!

Replying again just to say it’s not a stupid post. This is a safe space and we all get it. 💚

As part of my masking strategies (that I didn’t realize was masking until I figured out I’m probably autistic but I digress) most of my stims are either subtle/“internal” like playing beats with my teeth/tongue or wiggling my toes (shout-out to my kindergarten teacher who told me to do that instead of visibley fidgeting during the nation anthem) or they’re more “acceptable” like cracking my knuckles or pen twirling. I used to have a ballpoint pen that I liked to carry around, I didn’t write with it but the clicking mechanism was silent so I could click it in class without being disturbing to anybody.

I have my other stims that I do when I’m alone/with people I’m comfortable around but I definitely have a different set of stims I use when I’m masking. It might help to find something similar, something that satisfies the urge to stim while being subtle enough that you feel comfortable doing it around people

my stims are very vocal and i only feel safe to do them around my partner but in all other situations i just mask them away too, there are times i get into a panic cause i think someone else may have heard me.

it really sucks and i hope you can feel comfortable stimming again soon, maybe starting small or just around those you feel safe with? i don’t really have the best advice but yeah i relate comrade

When I’m alone I do a lot of vocal stimming or moving in weird ways because it’s fun. When I’m around people (who I don’t really want to explain things to, my friends are mostly autistic so I just be myself) I tend to find things to manipulate with my hands. Doesn’t need to be a “stim toy” just anything that’s satisfying to mess with. One thing I always have is my phone and the case it’s in. I like to pop one corner off and pop it back on. There’s a good amount of resistance and nice thwop sound when goes back into place. If there’s pens/pencils, I’ll mess with them in various ways. Cracking my knuckles is another one, popping each joint one-by-one. When I’m in a therapy session I’ll usually play with my bluetooth earphone case. I would say just think about things you do as do them, “Is this a stim?”. I was stimming without realizing it, until I figured out I was autistic. You might be, too.

I bite my fingernails to an unhealthily short length 🙃

I hope you find your stims again. I would consider what you need instead of what is given to you from outside to stim with, I feel like those are pretty restrictive and stimming can be so many things, all of which are valid. I am just starting to understand mine.

My stims are pretty varied, some good and some bad. When alone I tend to pick on my cuticles, been doing that since I was a kid and can’t seem to stop. I also mouth stim with a vape, also not great.

In public I stim with water and my water bottle. It took me decades to realize this is what I do. Not bad because I am always well hydrated as a result.

In school I used to draw in my notes all the time. Or decorate them in elaborate ways. I draw patterns when I am on the phone or otherwise need to focus.

Took up crocheting granny squares at uni to be able to sit in long seminars where scribbling is more visible. Decided to call the result my degree blanket which I’ll put together once I graduate. I am not really into crochet or knitting, but the squares are done fast enough to not make me bored and you can make all the colours. Started making them at team meetings at work too. The square is low effort and fast enough to get some nice dopamine from a finished square, I also tend to gamify it by seeing how many I can make per meeting.

I often click my name tag thingy, it makes a delicious snap. I don’t do this around others though.

I listen to pretty high energy EDM at work or when studying. It keeps me going. Not sure if it’s a stim exactly but it stimulates me. I also sometimes do a little dance when alone and listening to my music.

I also stim by lifting weights or other hard physical effort, eating delicious things, by observing nature or animals and many other things, but not sure what counts as a stim exactly. Personally considering it to be the things that keep me stimulated/deliver dopamine.