ADHD Stimming: Examples, Triggers, & How to Manage

What Is ADHD Stimming?

For people with ADHD, stimming is a form of self-stimulation activity used to help control their impulses and focus their attention. Additionally, stimming can also be a way to regulate emotions when someone with ADHD is feeling overwhelmed or bored.¹ While stimming is often associated with children, it’s also common in adult ADHD.

Here are some examples of common ADHD stims:

• Humming, whistling, or tongue clicking
• Biting or picking at fingernails
• Jiggling your foot
• Drumming or tapping fingertips
• Twirling your hair
• Rocking back and forth
• Doodling or writing the same words
• Clicking a pen
• Flipping the pages of a book or magazine
• Drawing or writing in a specific pattern
• Rearranging objects nearby
• Listening to the same song on repeat
• Picking at skin
• Pulling out hair
• Playing with the tag or texture of clothes
• Clenching and releasing muscles in the body
• Applying and reapplying chapstick or gloss
• Biting the inside of the cheek

Types of ADHD Stimming

Stimming can be verbal, physical, or mental. Generally speaking, stimming activity is not considered harmful and can be done in public without judgment.

Some examples of stimming include:

• Visual: Visual stimming involves the eyes or eyesight. Examples include staring at objects, repetitive blinking, or drawing.
• Verbal: Verbal stimming usually involves speaking, such as using one’s mouth, lips, or vocal cords audibly. Examples include repeating familiar words or song lyrics, giggling, or making random noises.
• Tactile: This type of stimming engages a person’s sense of touch. Examples include skin rubbing, hair twirling or pulling, hand movements, or chewing the inside of your cheeks.
• Vestibular: Vestibular stimming uses a person’s sense of balance to stim, such as rocking back and forth, spinning, or jumping.
• Other: Other examples of stimming in ADHD could be doomscrolling or writing words over and over.

Why Do People With ADHD Stim?

People with ADHD stim to feel calm, more alert, or focused in environments that are overwhelming to them. Due to an imbalance in certain brain chemicals, those with ADHD may have difficulty regulating their emotions. Stimming can balance out their moods or manage stress.³ Additionally, it can help someone with ADHD focus on the task at hand instead of getting distracted by thoughts about other things they need to do.

Here are some reasons a person with ADHD may stim:

• Cope with restlessness due to hyperactivity: Those with ADHD may have a hard time sitting still and dealing with hyperactivity, even if they can’t be doing something immediately. This can lead to restlessness, which can result in stimming behavior to manage feelings of being out of control.
• Reduce anxiety from being overstimulated: It’s common for individuals with ADHD to become overstimulated easily or experience sensory overload. This sensory overload can lead someone to stim to cope with their ADHD-induced emotional dysregulation.⁴
• Distract from boredom: Stimming may also be used if someone with ADHD is feeling under-stimulated, bored, distracted, or otherwise unable to pay attention to the task at hand. Stimming can help them focus on the task that needs completing or their current environment.
• Handle the stress of masking ADHD symptoms: Many adults learn to mask their ADHD symptoms. Although masking can help them avoid stigma, it is also exhausting and can cause stress. Stimming can help to reduce the stress of masking.
• Control impulsivity: Stimming can also help individuals with ADHD who struggle with impulse control. It helps them feel more grounded and calm and, therefore, able to carry out actions with more thought.
• Express happiness: Happy stimming is a way for individuals with ADHD to physically express joy or excitement. Happy stimming is usually an involuntary response to positive emotions and can look like bouncing or making excited vocalizations, allowing the person to release excess energy and fully embody their happiness.
• Enhance creativity: Certain stimming behaviors like doodling can help spark creative thinking or problem-solving by engaging different areas of the brain.
• Express frustration nonverbally: Stimming can be a way to release pent-up irritation or frustration without a verbal outburst, which can be helpful in situations where an outburst would be inappropriate.

Benefits & Drawbacks of ADHD Stimming

Self-stimulation is a way for people with ADHD to engage in self-care and regulate their emotions. It can help them feel calmer, more connected with their peers, less stressed, more focused, and better able to express their emotions. If stimming is not disruptive to everyday life, it can be integrated into one’s routine to become a positive habit.

Stimming needs to be managed if it interferes with work, school, or completing activities of daily living. It’s important to discuss a higher level of management of your stimming behavior with your care team so you can make the best and most appropriate decisions for your treatment. If your stimming is self-injurious to the point where it could be dangerous, harmful to another person, or excessively time-consuming, it could be time to speak with your doctor.

How to Manage ADHD Stimming

There is nothing wrong with stimming behavior, but if it is becoming disruptive, it may require management. Slowing down and paying attention to stimming behavior can help you understand why you are stimming in the first place. Once you understand what is driving the behavior, you can develop coping strategies to reduce ADHD symptoms and manage the stimming.

Here are seven ways to manage disruptive ADHD stimming:

1. Identify Triggers & Find Alternative Ways to Cope

The first step to managing ADHD stimming is to learn what is triggering it. Are you stimming from overstimulation, understimulation, or to cope with stress? Once you know the cause, you can begin to target the underlying reason, thereby reducing the stimming.

For example, if you are stimming because of stress, you can learn some stress management techniques, such as taking a midday exercise break or setting better boundaries at work. If you are stimming because of overstimulation,  you can learn to step outside for 5 minutes and regulate with some deep breathing exercises to combat anxiety.

2. Schedule in Appropriate Times to Stim

Stimming is not inherently a bad thing. In fact, it can be very helpful for regulating emotions and improving focus. Therefore, it can be helpful to identify when stimming is appropriate and when it may be inappropriate throughout the day. For example, you can try to limit stimming while in meetings or in the classroom, but allow yourself time to stim when alone in your office or once you get home from school.

3. Consider Medication to Manage Symptoms

ADHD medication is an effective intervention for managing stimming. Medication will help a person with ADHD reduce their impulsivity and hyperactivity and have better control of their behaviors. ADHD medication includes stimulants or non-stimulants. There are many different online ADHD psychiatry services, such as ADHD Online or Done, which make exploring ADHD medication more uncomplicated than ever.

4. Begin Therapy to Learn ADHD Coping Skills

Beginning therapy is a wonderful step to managing ADHD stimming. A therapist can help you identify what is driving your stimming behavior, as well as develop coping skills for ADHD to combat the behavior. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for ADHD is the most common intervention for managing stimming. It can help you develop deeper self-awareness and learn new skills for emotional regulation.

5. Make Healthy Lifestyle Changes

A more structured routine that involves healthy lifestyle changes could help control stimming. Try writing down a schedule every day so that you can stay on task or work in small blocks so that it is less overwhelming. Exercising is another way to manage ADHD symptoms, including stimming, as it decreases restlessness and creates a healthy distraction. Other examples could be shifting to an ADHD-friendly diet, taking regular breaks to manage stress, having creative outlets, or going to a quiet place when feeling overwhelmed.

6. Educate Others & Advocate for Yourself

If stimming interferes with your work or school, it’s important to speak up so that you can receive the support you need to manage your workload. At work, you can ask for ADHD disability accommodations if you need a different environment or more time to complete tasks. At school, you or your family can advocate for an individual education plan (IEP) to modify for ADHD learning disabilities. Although it can be difficult to speak up about stimming for a variety of reasons, remember that people in your life care about you and want you to be successful. They cannot do this if they don’t understand you’re struggling.

7. Create a Non-Disruptive Stim Tool Kit

Create a collection of stim-friendly items that are easily portable and not disruptive to others. Examples include putty, fidget spinners, textured fabrics, keychains, and stress balls. By having these tools on hand, you can self-soothe and maintain focus without drawing unwanted attention or causing distractions.

Free ADHD Worksheets

This workbook provides practical tools and strategies for managing ADHD symptoms. Find the one you need below or browse all our ADHD worksheets for more.

The Complete Workbook Download

Setting SMART Goals Download

Creating a Focus Plan Download

Challenging Negative Thoughts Download

How to STOP Impulsivity Download

Identifying Burnout Download

Overcoming Shame Download

When to Seek Professional Support

If your ADHD is getting in the way of your day-to-day functioning or your work and relationship aspirations, it may be time to seek professional help. There are many online ADHD treatment services that make finding specialized ADHD care easy and affordable.

In addition to individual therapy and medication, apps such as InFlow are a great source of added support. They provide an online community of individuals who are also struggling with ADHD, as well as accountability coaching and coping skills training.